Friday 26th September - An Appalling Experience

A recent comment:

'Another weekend, another appalling experience of antisocial behaviour courtesy of Mango's patrons. I live in a ground floor flat on Pennington Street and have become accustomed to the vile language, littering, violence and blasting of car stereos every weekend. However,last Friday (the 26th) brought new horrors.

I was watching a film at around midnight when I became aware of the sound of running water outside my window. I looked out to see a young Asian man urinating from the pavement down on to my kitchen window. I banged furiously on the window and he looked me straight in the eye, smiled and continued!! I ran in to the street to confront the delinquant and his gang of male friends who had congregated on the corner, and they had the gall to laugh at my protests. I called Limehouse police station and a few minutes later the police arrived and I positively identified the perpetrator (who denied the whole thing) but was nevertheless taken away in the back of a police van.

I am a 22 year old woman and yet I am forced into confrontations, altercations and police disputes with gangs of Asian men regularly at the weekends. I often have to open my ground floor bedroom window to ask rowdy drunks to turn down their stereos in the early hours, to which they aren't going to take kindly. I detest the vulnerable position I am in as these men could return to Mango's every weekend and obviously know where I live.'

Friday 19th September

I thought it was worth quoting the following comment, left today under an older post:

'The noise on Friday 19th September was unbearable. My girlfriend and I were woken up at 3am by groups of men swearing, shouting and loitering around our front door. This noise persisted until 4.45am! The next morning there was smashed glass, plastic bottles, hundreds of flyers for Mango’s and McDonalds litter strewn across the street where they had simply thrown it out of their cars. Surely Mango’s should have to take some form of accountability for the terrible state of the street?'

Did anyone else hear or see anything that night?

Thanks

Thanks to everyone who has visited the blog over the past week or so. It's no trouble for me to keep it updated but it would be a pointless affair without the comments and contributions of my neighbours.

A recent contributor pasted in a handy link to report anti-social behaviour to Tower Hamlets - I've put it at the top of the link list (right).

Please keep coming back. All comments are useful.

Safer Neighbourhoods

This online survey is quick, easy and anonymous -

http://www.met.police.uk/saferneighbourhoods/survey.htm

Community Safety Meeting - Update

I don’t want to hear your car stereo at 04:00 am is happy to report a very constructive meeting with Mr Daniel Oyebanjo, Community Safety Investigation Officer for the Borough of Tower Hamlets . Mr Oyebanjo is now fully aware of the sorts of problems we are facing in and around Pennington Street. He indicated a range of approaches that might help to alleviate the noise problem and also to tackle it at source. These approaches included liaison with Neighbourhood Safety Teams who may be able to patrol at the appropriate times, working with Highways to enforce parking restrictions wherever possible and contact with the Local Environment Teams to review any increases in littering.

Mr Oyebanjo can be contacted at - daniel.oyebanjo@towerhamlets.gov.uk

Meeting on Tuesday 16

I don't want to hear your car stereo at 04:00 am will meet with a Community Safety Investigation Officer this Tuesday, 16 September. The objective is to formally notify the Council of the problems we experience here. I will also invite the Community Safety people to get in touch with all of the relevant addresses in Telford's Yard, Breezers Court, Artichoke Hill and Pennington Street. 17 people have commented on the blog but I suspect that more will be affected.

I'll provide an update of the meeting as soon as possible.

Councillor email addresses

There are three local councillors listed under 'St Katharine's and Wapping' on the Tower Hamlets site. Their email addresses are as follows:

cllr.shafiqul.haque@towerhamlets.gov.uk

cllr.Denise.Jones@towerhamlets.gov.uk

cllr.emma.jones@towerhamlets.gov.uk

Tactics (2)

Call the cops!

The next time there is any noise please call Limehouse Police Station on 020 7515 1212. They have to log the call. The police call log will strengthen the council's hand and help us to get something done about this.

Tactics (1)

Mail your councillor!

I don’t want to hear your car stereo at 04:00 am has emailed various local councillors responsible for St Katharine’s / Wapping. Councillor Emma Jones and Councillor Denise Jones have both been very helpful. The latter has put me in touch with Andy Bamber, Service Head, Community Safety for Tower Hamlets. Mr Bamber is very approachable and very keen to help. I am currently waiting for one of his case workers to get in touch with a view to meeting me or, in fact, a group of residents.

The level of abuse and harassment suffered by my neighbours at ground level on Pennington Street / Artichoke Hill (see the comments on ‘Weekend Noise’) is truly appalling. I would urge these residents in particular to make a point of informing their local councillor of the ongoing problem.

Out of hours noise patrol - 020 7364 7070

Noise nuisance

The link will take you through to the Noise Nuisance page of towerhamlets.gov.uk

If you read the noise nuisance heading you will see that the definition includes,

'street parties and informal gatherings where amplification equipment is used'

and, even more appropriate for our problem,

'audio systems in stationary vehicles'.

The telephone number for the out of hours noise patrol is 020 7364 7070. The last thing I don't want to hear your car stereo at 04:00 am wants to do at 04:00 am is to call the council. However, it has to be done.

Encouraging news

I don't want to hear your car stereo at 04:00 am has just had a very helpful exchange of correspondence with The Times regarding the late night unruliness around Times House. Their security and facilities people are now aware of the goings on around their smoking shelter.

We can help The Times by continuing to collect photographic evidence of the noisemakers at work.

Office of Public Sector Information

The link goes through to a definition of the requirements for an Anti Social Behaviour Order. Urinating in the street, as shown in the photograph, above, may not on its own meet all the criteria for

an ASBO -

(behaving) 'in a manner that caused or was likely to cause harassment, alarm or distress to one or more persons not of the same household as himself'.

However the cummulative effect of loud car stereos, shouting, racing cars and so on must surely fit the bill. Why do we have to put up with this?