Thursday 31 January 2013

"West London borough set to axe bus stops ‘because they attract rubbish’ "

From The Evening Standard:

A council is to remove bus stops from residential streets, claiming that they encourage “abuse” of the facility.

Kensington and Chelsea council will only offer passengers a place to board or leave buses in busy areas, including shopping and tourist streets and outside schools, fast food restaurants and Tube stations.

The council feels that the bus stops are being used by large numbers of business users and local residents rather than the small numbers for which they are intended. A trial saw bus stops removed from one side of Earl’s Court Road, and council officers reported only a very slight increase in loitering.

But residents today said the policy would lead to “chaos” as people would not look for a bus stop elsewhere.

9 comments:

Graeme said...

They must have worked hard to find a picture of a bin to photograph. I thought they were all removed about 30 years ago to stop the IRA filling them with nail bombs. As far as I know, they never returned.

Mark Wadsworth said...

G, no, you do see quite a few nowadays. The IRA stopped cramming them with their business waste years ago.

A K Haart said...

The council's naked streets policy could cause even more loitering.

Ian Hills said...

Removing public loos has resulted in more p****** an sh****** against walls and in front gardens. So, more litter in streets.

Mark Wadsworth said...

AKH, that doesn't mean that people go round naked.

IH, initially I was going to write about public toilets being withdrawn, but then I thought that will get a bit messy, I'll write about bus stops instead. But yes, point taken.

View from the Solent said...

If K & C joined forces with Merton ...
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/9840279/Residents-may-have-to-wake-at-5am-to-put-out-their-bins.html

"They would only be able to leave waste on the public highway for collection during two hour-long slots - from 5pm to 6pm, and from 5am to 6am.
Collections of residential and commercial waste are then timed for between 6am and 8am, and 6pm and 8pm.
Those residents who fail to meet the restrictions imposed by Merton Council, in south London, will be fined. "

proglodyte said...

The slippery slope - now with have anti bins. Perhaps they'll be eventually banned in outside public spaces.

Mark Wadsworth said...

VFTS, sounds like a great plan!

"However with many working residents likely to arrive home from work after 6pm, homeowners will be forced to rise at 5am to put out their waste."

P, what's an anti-bin?

Jay said...

A few years back, when I was working in London, Westminster council removed at least 1/2 of their rubbish bins from the pavements. I believe the reason they gave at the time was something to do with needing fewer workers to empty them, due to budget cutbacks. (Funny how it's always the plebs who lose their jobs rather than the overpaid executives and middle managers... but I digress.) Nevertheless, the lack of bins certainly increased the amount of litter in the area.

Anyway, changing the subject, I spotted this, and it occurred to me that it could use a bit of the old Wadsworth treatment: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-21306006