|
|
 |
| |
Pet hates: Spitting, pavement cyclists
• DURING Camden’s review of its approach to anti-social behaviour, the citizens’ panel was asked, without prompts, “what behaviour, in public places, do you find irritating or disrespectful?”.
The majority of the responses were those expected by the experts (ie street drinking, drug taking, begging etc) but Camden residents also replied spitting and cycling on the pavement.
Responsible cycling is very important. Shortly after joining the council in 1998, I raised pedestrians’ concerns at cyclists failing to stop at red lights or at zebra crossings, cycling on pavements and cycling the wrong way down one-way roads.
To their credit, the Camden Cycling Campaign responded by putting up a guide to responsible cycling on their website (although it now seems to have been taken down).
Schools in Camden are doing their best to encourage more pupils to walk or cycle to school.
Residents will accept that young children will need to cycle on the pavement. However there is no excuse for adults, and a few anti-social cyclists are ruining the reputation of many others by ignoring the concerns of pedestrians. Of course children are much more likely to die if they are in collision with a car than a cyclist.
But if cars have stopped at a red light or a zebra crossing then the last thing children (or adults) will expect is a cyclist suddenly zooming past the stationary traffic as they are crossing the road.
All this type of behaviour will do is to drive mothers back into cars with their children as they will fear for their safety as they walk to school.
I would like to see the police take action to clamp down on such anti-social behaviour. Of course this is difficult, as cyclists do not wear licence-plates or other forms of identification.
Camden’s 100 plus CCTV cameras at road crossings and in bus lanes could surely also supply photos.
Poor behaviour by a few does damage the reputation of the many. I very much hope that Camden’s many responsible cyclists will also play their part by speaking to any anti-social cyclists that they spot while travelling about town.
Cllr Andrew Mennear
(Conservative)
Executive Member for Schools
Town Hall, WC1
• FURTHER to the letter about spitting: around the 1950s there was a bye-law prohibiting spitting in St Pancras (later Camden), the fine for this offence being £5, and was publicised on buses and lamp posts throughout the borough.
There was also a Register of Notifiable Diseases.
In 1950 there were just three cases of Tuberculosis (TB) recorded, so TB was virtually eradicated, and this proves a point.
E Bissell
Monica Shaw Court
Purchese Street, NW1
• WHAT a farce the council’s anti-social behaviour review has turned out to be! We waited nine months with council policy in limbo to be given the startling news that Asbos can indeed be an important tool in tackling crime. Surely anyone who lives in Camden already knew that tough action is sometimes needed to deal with the petty drug-dealers and vandals who can make life so unpleasant?
Apparently Cllr Ben Rawlings and the Lib Dems did not, and needed countless experts working at tax-payers’ expense to tell them.
What a waste of time and money! I had to laugh at Cllr Rawlings comment that his party’s apparent new tack marked no change of direction – it is obviously a humiliating climb-down.
The question now is whether the Lib Dems will finally be able to get on with the job of tackling anti-social behaviour when their real views are so out of line with those of Camden residents.
Anna-Helga Horrox
Hawley Road, NW1
• I AM also a resident of Camden Town and live on the same street as Mr Greening. While we are neighbours, I must disagree with his letter published last week.
He claims that the former Labour administration’s approach to tackling crime and anti-social behaviour had an over-reliance on Asbos and suggests that there should be a combination of regeneration, increased visible patrols and other factors like CCTV.
Err...this is precisely the approach we did have. I know, as I was not only a Camden Town councillor and resident but former lead for Community Safety.
The Labour councillors for Camden Town fought for investment and won it for St Martin’s Garden, the Canal, Inverness Street and Hawley Open Space. We pushed for a police base in Camden Town and there is now one in Greenland Road.
We pushed for more CCTV and lighting and again this was introduced. We also pushed for investment in local facilities for young people and other support networks.
We set up a community forum so people could find out what is going on and shape their local services. We supported the setting up of the business association. We also argued for more policing – and an increase in the Camden Town police team above the normal quota – to deal with the very problematic situation the area faces and to have a visible police presence.
The new Tory/Lib Dem administration, (and the Lib Dems in particular) might be claiming the benefits of this approach as their own, but the fact is that this approach and the key decisions to bring it about were taken by the previous Labour administration.
Instead of building on this work there has been first vacillation and then cuts to the very services – like to community centres and youth services – that combine with – visible patrols, regeneration, CCTV, Asbos etc – to create that rounded approach Mr Greening outlines.
I think he should be actually be pointing the finger at the new administration and asking whether these cuts will be harming this approach.
Jake Sumner
Chalk Farm Road, NW1
|
 |
|
|
|
