Quick rant.
Over the past couple of weeks, I've seen piles of rubbish left on Plumstead Common. I'd imagine the selfish fools who left this mess think it'll magically disappear. I'd imagine the good folk of the Plumstead Common Environment Group have had to clean up after them.
I've a good mind to phone Greenwich Council about this. Fortunately, it's the same bunch of people and fortunately, I know where they live. I don't hold out much hope that anything can/will be done about it though.
21 comments:
This is happening continually. I have seen people unloading their crap here over the years, my husband even stopped once to tell them not to, to no avail. It is ridiculous bearing in mind the dump is 5 minutes down the road and you can throw your stuff away for free.
this has increased since the changes in the council collections of domestic rubbish. black bin bags are all over the streets, ripped open. and these have been thrown on to the common continuously, perhaps in frustration by residents that the council fails to collect?? who knows... but the new scheme is really is a load of old stinking rubbish... literally!
Hey can we have an uplifting section on this blog please, maybe a joke corner or somthing, here ill get it started
"i used to file my nails ,,,, then i thought aghhh whats the point in keeping them"
Unfortunately, there's nothing funny in living in the people's republic of Greenwich.
JJ - if you dont like living here then move! Simple.
At least some people like me and the first poster on here take pride in our community and dont just sit around and moan all day.
As to the second poster - yes thats right blame the council for the scum that are dumping rubbish. I mean it was ofcourse council officers who left this rubbish out (not).
As the previous poster said the tip is five mins away. Its free to use. The scum that mess up our borough should be named and shamed.
hey, chill. i am the second post. i wasn't blaming the council for stupid people who dump their rubbish. but the council have IN ADDITION been inefficient in their roll out of the new scheme, and have been slow in resolving subsequent problems. hence the compulsion of idoits to throw their scummy sacks of rubbish on our beautiful common. i have dragged such bags to near bins for collection, made numerous calls to clean sweep, picked up rubbish all over the place with PCEG, etc. i fully understand the problems of local people polluting our local environment. however the council need to be responsible about being more efficient, about enforcement and about cracking down on those who dump rubbish, litter and don't follow the new rubbish management scheme.
Living in Greenwich, the only fun we get, is to have a moan.
Unfortunately the council make it so easy for us.
Talking rubbish says we should all be doing our bit.
I tend to agree with that but I also think the council should do their bit.
After all, they're paid for it we're not.
To my mind, if GBC could do one thing to improve rubbish collections it would be to acknowledge that approximately 28% of Londoners don't drive and therefore taking rubbish to the dump is not an option. Therefore it leaves some of us having to hire private refuse collectors to do this for us, or, the less caring, to dump stuff on the Common. There ought to be some way to solve this but I'm stuffed if I can thing of one.
Why would anyone hire private refuse collectors?
If you are a resident of the peoples republic of Greenwich, you pay rates to the council, so they collect your rubbish.
they don't collect all rubbish. like large items (old furniture, mattresses, etc - like what I see rotting in front of people's houses!). or in the case of one doing garden work, they won't take remnants of an old patio. this can't go in black bin, or in green waste, or recycling. it's heavy and needs to go to the dump. no car means we have to pay for someone to collect it. that's reality JJ. for large items, the council will collect it, but you have to pay these days. I think prices start at £12, not a huge amount, but for some it is simpler, easier and cheaper to dump their crap on the common, rather than pay for council or other collection, or take it down to the dump.
I still don't see why you would pay a private refuse collector.
Phone the council and they will collect. Ok, they will now charge, but it's cheaper than a private collector.
Obviously it costs nothing to dump it on the common. The council then collect when someone phones up and complains.
The council used to collect for nothing. So there was never any need to dump rubbish in the streets or on the common.
Perhaps there is someone at the council with a brain, who could work out that it is cheaper to collect all rubbish from houses without charge. And much better for the environment.
I doubt it though!!! Just put the rates up.
I wasn't aware that GBC have started collecting larger items of at a charge. I always new they would take furniture by arrangement but this is news to me. Obviously I've missed something.
I have spent many months lobbying the council about the state of the recycling site and the consequences for the common. I've had 2 site meetings where action was promised.
I went to a conference on Environmental Crime and persuaded the council to send delegates. It was an opportunity for me to network with other local authority officers and learn from them (while the LBG officers huddled in a corner with their tea). I have provided the address and description of some regular offenders at the Links site. I have photographed people ransacking the bins. And the council's enforcement team have actually issued 2 FPNs at the site all year! I wonder if it is only 2 because when they monitored the site they stood by the bins looking very much like a couple of enforcement officers?!
I've just returned from holiday, and was horrified to see the state of the common. Even before I went into the house I collected half a sackful from just opposite. What astonishes me is that we all bought houses here because of the common and yet I am one of only two people in this whole street who ever actually picks up rubbish from it.
I wonder if anyone from the council will go to the follow-up conference "Enforcing Environmentl Crime"? I wonder if it will make any difference? I wonder whether the council have actually issued an FPN for dog fouling yet? I wonder if they have managed to persuade the Dog Warden that should be actually be part of his job - like in any other borough that is actually prepared up to deal with environmental crime? They haven't replied to any requests for info nor publicised any environmental crime FPNs in the local press - which they promised they would. End of rant. Nearly the end of chairing the PCEG for me. I just can't take much more of the frustration at the council's box ticking strategic initiatives that never make any difference on the actual ground here.
has there been a bed sale recently? In the last 2 days I have seen 5 mattresses on the road. 4 on Brewery Road and 1 on Parkdale Road.
School holidays, more kids around, more rubbish!!
what's wrong with the parents that they can't teach their kids right from wrong! but then i guess the parents would have needed to learn that themselves in the first place.
i want more on-the-spot fines for those who litter and more serious action on fly tippers.
more residents need to report environmental crime - and it is a crime!! more residents need to participate in look after their neighbourhood.
(also the Skanska Thames Water guys leave their lunch/snack rubbish all over their site which are our streets! call Skanska and complain everyone!!)
as a once-hopeful resident of plumstead common - hopeful that the area would improve as more people recognised the area as a gem of se london (with the common and other green spaces) - i feel disappointed and ready to move as soon as the housing market recovers (seriously!).
i will soon be outta this place because it seems to me that things will continue as they are; and I am sick of seeing grafitti, encounter chavs (that's right, chavs!), treading through rotting food and nappie saks on the streets, finding litter everywhere!
even as a PCEG member and knowledge of lots of people who care about the area and do something about it, i feel sick and sad when i walk around the place and have to walked through other people's rotting rubbish, litter on the common.
it's a an absolute disgrace - and that is down to many many locals, besides the council failing to implement proper refuse collection and serious enforcement.
yvqoiphnick - I dont think you are being very rational in your argument for once.
The council cannot act on hearsay. Just beacuse you have seen people dump rubbish and probably followed them back to their home, your word, no matter how truthful, is not evidence in itself.
They can only fine people they catch littering. Plain and simple.
I welcome the fact that the council have introduced - and started to use - fines for all sort of littering offences.
They haven't always got everything right but the councillor in charge sems to be taking a very tough line that is paying dividends. She's not only leading from the front - getting involved in local graffiti clean up groups - but also appears to be a good listener. Following lobbying from PCEG she got in some new dog mess cleaners. Credit where its due.
And the council has also been honest about areas it can improve -giving you space in Greenwich Time to attack them for what you perceive to be their failings.
yup OK gill fair enough. I was in a despairing mood but am pleased to say that the council HAVE listened and are putting together a bunch of things to attack this particular problem. I got a bit over-angry and irrational for a moment there. Surveillance will be put in place now - what we've been asking for for a long time now
Oh we all do it at times - but I think its sometimes easy to blame the people who have to deal with the problem
ie the council in this case
rather than the people creating it in the first place
ie the scum dropping the litter
Anyway keep up the good work Nick and PCEG.
And Nick - when can we next expect to read an update from you in Greenwich Time. Have you got a regular column in the paper now?
Gill, I understand you standing up for the Council, but even though Nick has voiced his opinions vociferously, I absolutely stand by him and his tone of voice. Without Nick's passion, drive and belief in our area nothing will get done. Nick and the PCEG are a priceless asset to our community and they deserve far more recognition and respect than they do now.
From what I gather, trying to get the Council to do anything is like trying to turn an oil tanker. I'd expect this is the norm when dealing with Councils. It doesn't suit them to be easy to deal with. Like it doesn't suit them to sort out if I've over-payed on council tax, but it absolutely suits them when I'm late in paying. Funny how they can swing into action very swiftly when it suits them, eh?
Hey Nick
when you said surveillance would be put in place what exactly did you mean????? and more to the point where, i seriousy hope that the council are not spending yet more money on cctv. I cant believe that the counci are very to keen to let more and more events be held on Plumstead Common every year but they show pretty much no interest in its upkeep, i complained for months and months about the state of the metal railings that suround the common and eventually they came out and fixed one or two lengths, there are probably another 40 or so need repairing and they also replaced it with nothing similar to the exisiting material .
hello anonymous
glad you're upset aboutthe railings. so are we. trouble is the concrete posts are impossible to source. so said the council and I've been searching for more than 2 years. If you fond some tell the council. re surveillance - there has to be photo evidence of the licence plates to issue FPNs - hence the cameras. who are you?? why not use a name? moone will hurt you for having a reasonable opinion. keep lobbying the council cos it's wearing me out!
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