Biggest problem on Peckham Rye right now is . . ?

[Lee Scoresby]

a) Dogs - about which Southwark is presently obsessed, or

b) Piles of garbage left by football teams, to which Southwark remains utterly indifferent.

The attached was taken a few hours ago on the so-called Grasslands East area, but similar scenes - and worse - can be seen all over our park at the end of any summer evening or weekend day.

Q's to Southwark Parks management:

Has littering EVER been raised with teams applying to use our park for games?

Has any group EVER even been warned?

Has there been a SINGLE prosecution by a Southwark officer of these littering groups as they saunter off leaving their mess?

Thought not. (Unsurprising, really. Last time I looked, the TOTAL of prosecutions for littering ANYWHERE in Southwark over many years, was less than 20.)

And: What happened to the big solemn promise - made here on the EDF - several years ago to put out extra bins for football groups to use?

Weird wrong priorities by officers and councillors - most of whom probably couldn't find the Rye with satnav.

Lee Scoresby

[jimbo1964]

It's a disgrace how much rubbish is left behind. Why can't there just be a rule that teams who book the pitches take their rubbish home. If they don't they can't book a pitch again.

[Jules-and-Boo]

it's not just football that causes littering - I've seen a group of people literally get up from their picnic and walk off - leaving everything on the ground where they were sitting.

If Southwark had the money they would do nicely collecting fines for littering and might even improve the borough.

General thinking, from what I understand, is that it's somebody's job to clean it up...and on the street, it is.

[Orange owl]

The litter is crap. But dealing with dog shit and dog owners when you have young children is unbelievable

[Harry]

Perhaps a returnable deposit might do the trick

[Lee Scoresby]

Y'know, Orange owl, equating fellow human beings who happen to have dogs with excrement - not very nice, not very helpful. The dog owners and walkers I know and talk to are highly responsible people. We would be happier than anyone else if non-picker-uppers and yobby owners were dealt with very firmly indeed. Why happier? Because it would draw a clear line between them and the great majority of good dog-people.

I myself go out of my way to offer to let little kids say hello to my dogs (one of them large) and stroke them, in a safe supervised manner. Or else I keep my pets well out of the way, absolutely right and no problem . . . Live and let live.

Likewise, dogs hassling picnickers is unacceptable, but the flipside, as J-and-B points out, is the vast amount of junk food tossed or abandoned on the Rye and in the Park. Which is indeed littering, and also a huge problem for people exercising their dogs.

Are we really to believe it is somehow impossible for Southwark officers to be in place to confront such predicable (end of a game, end of a picnic/BBQ) and visible littering offences?

My theory (and as elsewhere, I'll no doubt be attacked for saying so) is that the faceless-nameless senior officers and politicians who really run the local authority are going for a strategy of maximum monetisation of public spaces: as many school and other groups during the day; as many football games in the evening and weekends. Which is both understandable in these times and absolutely fine, except:

- Southwark Parks is then highly reluctant to upset these 'nice little earning streams' - preferring that a cleaner scuttles round the morning after (thereby setting up a system that actually 'justifies' the littering).

- The strategy requires a little covert lifestyle 'cleansing', to eliminate park users who might get in the way of this busy lucrative vision, and do not themselves pay for their use of this public space. Like dog walkers.

Just a theory . . .

LS

[Orange owl]

Wow. Have a puff on this ..x

[maxxi]

A total carnage visited on a beloved local amenity...or a few plastic water bottles easily cleared up by the already paid park staff? Oh the humanity.

[first mate]

I regularly find shards of glass all over the park, another example of littering that is both dangerous and seemingly unreported. Should there be a ban with fines for those taking glass items into the park?

Lee I think you make some intersting points. You cannot have mass use of playing fields, especially by children, if dogs are able to run round free. There was talk some years ago of Harris partly sharing the financial burden of running PR. The tunnel vision the Council has about dogs in the park makes you wonder.

[jimbo1964]

maxxi Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> A total carnage visited on a beloved local

> amenity...or a few plastic water bottles easily

> cleared up by the already paid park staff? Oh the

> humanity.

Yes brilliant. Let's all just drop all our shit where we fancy because 'someone else will pick it up'. Marvellous outlook.

[Nigello]

Yeah, and whilst we're at it, just piss up against a wall as we're tagging our sub-literate scrawl on the art there, cos, like, it's cool to do so!

[Lynne]

Dogs. How is it that every dog owner is nice, clean, considerate, and if, they are to believed, has had their dog surgically fitted with a cork so that it never never relieves itself anywhere but at home

Yet Goose Green is a dog's toilet and the pavements aren't exactly free of dog mess.

[Abe_froeman]

I'm going with a) as well. The strets and parks are paved with dog mess and the council do nothing about it. At least they clear rubbish away. The dog eggs are just left to rot