tidybs5

  • Happy Easton

    Steve WoodsBristol, Media

    As a part of inner city Bristol, Easton tends to get into the papers for all the wrong reasons, such as fly-tipping (posts passim).

    However, it’s a vibrant area where I’ve lived for nearly 4 decades and so it can’t be all that bad, as is shown by the fact that community campaigners Happy Easton have produced their own video version of the record-breaking Pharrell Williams hit “Happy” to show a more positive side of Easton.

    The video was filmed at 18 sites around the area including Easton Community Centre, Trinity Community Arts, the soon to be shut Trinity Police Station and various local shops and takeaways.

    Are the dancing cops and PCSOs as embarrassing as your relatives at a wedding? Answers in the comments below! 🙂

  • Jane Street, Bristol celebrates Zero Waste Week

    Steve WoodsBristol, Politics, Social Media

    Zero Waste Week, now in its seventh year, is currently taking place in the United Kingdom between 1st and 7th September 2014.

    The aim of Zero Waste Week is to “an opportunity to reduce landfill waste & save money“.

    The theme of this year’s event is “One More Thing“.

    Jane Street in Redfield, Bristol, shows in the picture below just what can be achieved with “One More Thing” in Zero Waste Week, in this case, one more instance of fly-tipping!

    Jane Street fly-tipping
    Image courtesy of Amy Harrison

    As part of the campaign to clear up Easton and Lawrence Hill wards (under the #tidybs5 moniker. Ed.), I recently attended a meeting with Marg Hickman, my local councillor, and council officers (news passim). At that meeting I was informed by the officers that the problem of fly-tipping in Jane Street had disappeared since a local mafrish – a café used for chewing khat – had closed down following the UK’s outlawing of khat. Obviously the council officers concerned hadn’t bargained for the persistence of Bristol’s filthy fly-tipping community!

    Besides alerting @BristolCouncil via Twitter, fly-tipping can be reported to the city council by:

    • using the dedicated fly-tipping report form on the council website (which also has a mobile version that works on smartphones);
    • a third party smartphone app, such as My Council (which is available for both Android and iOS; and
    • telephoning 0117 922 2100.

    The most direct reporting route is using the fly-tipping form as the report is sent directly to the department concerned, whereas the other methods require the report to be forwarded by its original recipient.

  • Street furniture

    Steve WoodsBristol, Language, Politics

    According to Wikipedia, street furniture is a collective term for objects and pieces of equipment installed on streets and roads for various purposes. It includes benches, traffic barriers, bollards, post boxes, phone boxes, streetlamps, traffic lights, traffic signs, bus stops, tram stops, taxi stands, public lavatories, fountains, watering troughs, memorials, public sculptures, and waste receptacles.

    image of fly-tipped chairs

    The communal refuse bin in the picture above is street furniture, the office chairs lazily left beside it are not; they are fly-tipping.

    Tackling fly-tipping, litter and waste in some parts of Bristol can seem at times like nailing fog to the wall and the fly-tipping shown above has been notified to Bristol City Council via Twitter and complete with the #tidybs5 hashtag (posts passim).

    Besides Twitter, fly-tipping can be reported to the city council by:

    • using the dedicated fly-tipping report form (also has a mobile version that works on smartphones);
    • a third party smartphone app, such as My Council (which is available for both Android and iOS; and
    • telephoning 0117 922 2100.

    The most direct reporting route is using the fly-tipping form as the report is sent directly to the department concerned, whereas the other methods require the report to be forwarded.

  • #tidyBS5 in the Bristol Post

    Steve WoodsBristol, Politics

    This blog has previously highlighted the problem of fly-tipping in the Easton and Lawrence Hill areas of Bristol (posts passim).

    The move to get more people involved in reporting and combating this menace that blights the inner city took another step forward two days ago when it was featured in the Bristol Post, as shown by the following screenshot.

    Bristol Post article image

    I was contacted by the Post’s Sophie Prideaux and we exchanged emails that went on to form the basis of the article and, as I’m feeling charitable, I’ll even forgive her for changing my surname from plural to singular halfway through the piece. 🙂

    Sophie also contacted my local councillor, Marg Hickman, who’s been a great support from the outset.

    Another purpose of the article was to publicise the #tidyBS5 hashtag, which is being used to highlight the scourge of fly-tipping in the BS5 postal area on social media, such as Twitter.

    As regards Marg’s involvement, the Post states:

    Mrs Hickman, a Labour councillor for Lawrence Hill ward, is urging residents to get behind #tidyBS5, saying it’s an “important initiative to improve the quality of life of residents living in BS5”.

    Read the Post’s report.

  • #tidyBS5 gains momentum

    Steve WoodsBristol, Politics, Social Media

    After the last Easton & Lawrence Hill Neighbourhood Forum meeting where I talked about fly-tipping in my area of Bristol (posts passim), it was suggested to me that I devise a hashtag for use on Twitter and elsewhere to help highlight the problem. My answer was #tidyBS5.

    The hashtag and its use have now been given another boost by publicity in the fortnightly Easton & Lawrence Hill Neighbourhood Management email bulletin.

    image from newsletter featuring tidybs5

    There’s also a meeting with councillors and officers on fly-tipping and rubbish in just over a week’s time to which I’ve also been invited. Let’s hope it ends in some proper enforcement and action to make scenes like the one below a thing of the past.

    image of Stapleton Rd fly-tipping

  • Talking rubbish

    Steve WoodsBristol, Oddities, Politics, Social Media

    One perennial problem in the Easton district of Bristol where I live is fly-tipping, the illegal dumping of waste.

    trade and other waste dumped by communal bin for household waste in Stapleton Road, Easton
    Disgraceful! Trade & other waste dumped by communal bin for household waste in Stapleton Road, Easton

    Some areas – such as Stapleton Road (see above picture) – have persistent problems and last night I gave a short presentation at the latest Easton & Lawrence Hill Neighbourhood Forum meeting to try and encourage other residents and those who work in the area to get involved and make Easton a tidier place.

    I’m pleased to say I received whole-hearted support from local councillor Marg Hickman, who is equally concerned about the amount of litter on the streets (are fly-tipping and littering related; does one attract the other? Ed.).

    Flytipping can be reported online using the council’s dedicated report form. Some people use Twitter to do so too, whilst for those with a smartphone various third party applications are available, such as My Council.

    If anyone does draw attention to fly-tipping or litter on Twitter, you might like to add the hashtag #tidybs5. If you live elsewhere in Bristol you might like to adapt the #tidybs* hashtag, replacing the asterisk with the first figure of your postcode.

    Yesterday I did learn prior to the Neighbourhood Forum meeting that persistence pays off: via an email from the city council I learnt that several traders on Stapleton Road are or have been served with fixed penalty notices for fly-tipping by enforcement officers. It’s a start, but I get the impression that fly-tipping will be as hard to eradicate as a Hammer horror film vampire.

    Bristol will be European Green Capital in 2015. Unless it sorts out fly-tipping and other environmental problems in Easton and the city’s other less prosperous areas (like the plague of flies, dust and other industrial pollution in Avonmouth. Ed.), the accolade should be amended to read European Greenwash Capital.

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