Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
UPDATE: RUBBISH AROUND TURNPIKE LANE
after 9 days of daily tweets, fixmystreet reports and emails, A Veolia employee was waiting for me on Thursday at the spot I have been twice daily tweeting (@itsafaff) a photo of the problem. Just one small example of a much wider problem in the borough.
He explained Frome Road is a collection point, collection schedules etc. The council have now closed the case and assume this is now resolved. But a conversation is not a resolution and to assume that it is speaks volumes about the council’s response to the problem. I wrote to CLLR Mallet today and below is the text of the email. It summarises activity over the last 10 days.
I picked the area around Turnpike Lane specifically because I go there every day, it is small and I wanted to focus on one example of a bigger problem. Get something done there and move on ... As others are doing with some success. Your advice, support appreciated.
· We need bins at the major collection points. There are bins outside Hornsey Station. I notice a difference in the services and facilities for the posher parts of the borough.
· We need these bins at Turnpike Lane/Westbury Avenue around the tube. Specifically Frome Road. There are many cafes in this area, more shops than around Hornsey Station. Stuart McNamara tweeted yesterday at 1pm that they will locate a bin where there is a similar problem, as a pilot – can you do this for us?
· We need Veolia to collect at the times it says it will – and not to neglect an area in the hope that no one will notice or be bothered to complain.
· We need more frequent collections.
Since I began making a fuss about the problem around Turnpike Lane tube station, this is what has happened:
· I leafleted 20 shops around the station. Discussed the problem with staff, managers and owners. Many were open and supportive. I have noticed that the supermarket and the taxi firm outside the station are now sweeping the pavement outside their shops daily.
· I have tweeted (@itsafaff) daily/timed photos of uncollected rubbish bags, specifically at the collection point at the end of Frome Road and used the app FixMyStreet to report it.
· A Veolia representative approached me there on Thursday morning to explain that it is a collection point and the collection should take place twice a day. They do not – not every day, my pics and tweets prove it.
· In 10 days tweeting and campaigning about this very tiny area – I have found that there are many people doing the same as me, who are not happy with the way Haringey Council and Veolia manage waste collection. IE piles of rubbish waiting at ‘collection points’ and insufficient collections.
· The Veolia rep told me that there are two collections daily – and two vans to do the job in the borough. Is this sufficient? Many people living and working in Haringey would say not.
· It is bad for business. There is a new gastro-style pub opening on Westbury Avenue (The Westbury)spending considerable amounts of money doing the place up – they support what We are doing and have tweeted that they don’t like the mounds of rubbish lining the street – especially the very big pile that often lies neglected on Frome Rd.
· The businesses around Turnpike Tube – whilst they are responsible for the bags because they generate the waste, don’t think the council collects often enough.
There remains a problem. Despite the response below – it is NOT resolved.
· Piles of rubbish bags sit at the end of Frome Road (and many other places in the borough) and remain uncollected for long periods of time. I have never once walked past this spot and not seen a pile of rubbish bags.
· The piles of bags encourage others to dump their waste. This is clear by the amount the piles grow, the black, and other bags that are added, and the other items dumped with them.
· This system of managing waste collection is failing the borough. It is unsanitary.
· The piles stain the pavement – badly. And leave a strong smell, especially in warm weather.
· I have seen rats, birds and foxes pulling the bags apart and spreading the rubbish.
Would you be kind enough to give me a proper response, one that will give me some faith that I am not dismissed as a nutter, that you take the issue seriously, that you will arrange for a bin at the collection point on Frome Road, that you will ensure that the service provided by Veolia meets need and that they carry out their contractual obligations.
Turnpike Lane tube station is a magnificent modernist building. Arriving in that hall is impressive. Coming out of it is not. This is one small thing that is within our power to change.
Jackie Chambers
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Abi on
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Julia, it's very interesting that you received such a thorough reply as I have never had anything in so much details when reporting the SAME PROBLEM in another part of the borough.
We can catch up on Twitter, but if you could provide me with the contact at the council that you wrote to, that would be amazing. I've generally gone with warm leads from my residents' assoc connections, but they've gone strangely cold after my last attempt to bring up this issue...
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Permalink Reply by Julia on
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Abster, I initially sent my comments via the feedback form on the website - http://www.haringey.gov.uk/index/contact/complaints/suggestions.htm and logged it as a suggestion (I was pointing out an issue with the Our Haringey app sending my report to the City of London - as per this thread) rather than Haringey (which I also got a reply about), but to be fair to them they did also try to address the underlying issue with the bin).
Even though I marked it as a suggestion they have treated it as a stage 1 complaint which I think is why I got a fuller response than others might. That particular part of the response came from the 'Street Cleansing – Village Manager' via enquiries.haringey@veolia.com - I'll PM you his name separately because I don't want to start bandying names of workers around publicly when my beef is with the overall strategy, or lack of, for tackling the underlying issues rather than any individual.
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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I wonder how much shame there is. Perhaps not even some mild embarrassment. Perhaps Cllr Claire Kober really believes her Manifesto claim that: "Our streets are among the cleanest in London and resident satisfaction is at its highest level ever", Or prattle about empowering communities and "doing better for less"
On Sunday afternoon a large Kurdish demo along High Road Tottenham held up the buses and other traffic. For a while it was faster to walk and I got an up-closer than usual view of dumping along West Green Road. It seems many people think it's perfectly fine to pile garbage on any available corner, and especially next to litter bins.
With another £75 million to be hacked off the Council's budget for 2015/16, I dread to think how our streets will look in twelve months time.
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Abster, the last thing I'd suggest is that anyone should stop highlighting them. But as people on HoL have realised, the response - however genuine - is unlikely to lead to solutions "upstream" which tackle causes. And this is less likely as committed and responsive staff who do want to take action are constantly being reorganised and/or cut.
However scathing and angry I am about the failed Kober Kouncil, I accept that the biggest factor is the national government policy to "shrink the State". (Note to myself: Buy a new copy of J.K Galbraith's "Affluent Society" and refresh my understanding of "private affluence" and "public squalor".)
But living in Koberville is a factor too. It's a weird place where there's always money for consultants and interims; for vanity projects; and for the Council's Propaganda Unit. And where, right now, tens of thousands are being poured down the drain hiring lawyers to attack a trade unionist who speaks truth to power. (If anyone's interested in watching, the Council's QC will again be in action this Thursday and Friday in the High Court. Declaration of Interest: Julie and David Davies are personal friends of ours.)
How did we get here? An alternative universe where Haringey's "leading" councillors actually seem to believe what they spout about having the cleanest streets. About empowering local residents by ignoring us. Just as they may believe that flattening people's homes and businesses will somehow "regenerate" our communities.
Over the years I've struggled to understand why this is so. Trying out different theories. Is it "cognitive dissonance"? Blocking out factual information which conflicts with their tenaciously-held belief system?
Injelititis is another explanation I've suggested from time to time.
But whatever the reason or reasons, unless people are happy to accept "fixes" which are temporary at best, we'll need to highlight problems to outsiders as well as to our ward councillors, senior officers and "cabinet" councillors.
And saying loudly that it's more than rubbish in the streets showing that Koberville doesn't work. That "empowerment" doesn't mean filling in a Survey Monkey questionnaire - which will almost certainly be ignored. That the "Leader and Cabinet System" has failed. And that national taxation should be high enough to fund decent public services.
I'd add that an 85% election turnout is not just for Scots. Provided people think their votes really count and can change something.
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I get that. The policy of 'shrinking the state' could not be more visible. But, I just don't think many of us are convinced by the argument that constant reactive work by Veolia is any more cost-effective than tackling the causes.
If someone could present the facts convincingly, we might be more resigned to the situation. But what I see is a lot of complaints which are, in fairness, swiftly responded to - when the complaints and the problems leading up to the could be eradicated or massively reduced with something that SEEMS to a layperson, quite simple.
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Permalink Reply by Jackie Chambers on
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On twitter i am @itsafaff
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Julia / good idea bt they v long tags n not much room for yr msg ... Shorten? Something snappier? Just #rubbish n save space to @veolia and others?
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#HaringeyRubbish has been suggested so I'm using that. It'd be great if others would too.
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Will do
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Permalink Reply by Alison P on
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I hate the rubbish around Haringey - don't know the situation on the west of the borough so well, but around here it is just terrible. Residents dump bags, traders and Veolia do the same - foxes/rats/gulls rip them open, they stain the pavement, smell, encourage more dumping etc etc.
The problem is what to do instead.
A few months ago I posted some pictures of what they do in Edinburgh, where they have areas that aren't suited to big wheelie bins. They use large municipal waste bins with lids that stay on the road (and not the pavement), residents have to put their waste in them and they are collected regularly. That seems one possible solution for some areas, perhaps for traders as well as residents. However, a few people responded by saying that these sorts of solutions a) encourage more dumping and b) are harder to use for the elderly and the physically infirm. I'm also uncomfortably reminded of the fact that when I first moved to Harringay in 2001 there were similar large bins (without lids) being used by traders for their waste. These were usually positioned on the ladder roads (surprise!! - I assume the garden ones too) - but they always ended up overflowing and often were on the pavement and not the road, causing many of the problems that are still an issue today.
I'm also very aware of the fact that all of this just tackles one side of the problem - and doesn't address the bigger issue which is how residents and traders deal with their waste - the stuff we all generate and which we should all be taking more responsibility for.
All of that said, I'd like to see some bigger bins trialled as they can't be any worse than the current situation. I'd also like to see much more action by Haringey to deal with residents and traders who don't dispose of their rubbish properly. Finally I'd like to see our councillors engage with residents so that we can address the impact that some of the shops/restaurants have on local residents. There are some amazing pictures on Twitter of the Pemberton Road pavement this morning - there is so much rubbish on the pavement from one of the restaurants that you actually can't walk on it. They should be fined for that, surely?
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I think 'can't be worse than the current situation' is key here. Yes, they might encourage people to rubbish when they become full, but at the moment we have people using street litter bins for the same purposes - and even worse, they are being reassured by Veolia/HC that it's OK to do this. Near me there are casual arrangements set up that ensure this practice continues.
I can't personally see any strong argument against just bringing in some industrial-sized bins in problem areas. The reason given for why that this is often not considered, is that people can't be trusted not to steal them. Isn't that great?
I would love to know whether this attitude is taken when dealing with these issues in the West of the borough. FOI anyone?
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