SO THERE went summer. I know it goes more quickly as you age and grow grumpy but this one really has sped past at an alarming rate. We waited months for the sun to come out then, blink, the kids were swarming the pavements, blink, it was Folk Week (in which they did not seem to swarm in quite the same quantities as usual) and now one opens one’s eyes to find Lo, it’s Bank Holiday Weekend and the double parking is pretty much over. Let us hope that September proves warm so we can get in a few more doses of vitamin D before the long winter ahead and that Margate keeps up the good work. While nationally, the numbers of trips to the coast, are falling year on year, our very own seaside resort has been bucking the trend with over 13,000 tourists popping into the Visitor Information Centre in July. Hurrah for the shops and businesses and if you’re fed up with outsiders clogging up the coffee shops and fast food outlets, moan not. It will be February before you know it.
ANOTHER reason to lament the end of Summer – it’s a time to watch where you walk. An email from TPPS (The Phantom Poo Sprayer), bringing me up to date with activities, assures me that “dog dumping is seasonal!” TPPS – the self-appointed guardian of Ramsgate pavements, who has appeared on these pages before, has now spray-painted 156 offerings with its trademark biodegradable pink paint, spanning some 18 roads in Ramsgate, and can state categorically “there is less in the summer than other months.” TPPS puts this down to the lighter evenings, which is only logical. Culprits feel less able to walk away from the evidence that they are irresponsible half-wits, when they might be spotted – and hopefully tackled – by their fellow citizens, or caught on CCTV. I have noticed a dramatic uprise in abandoned turds on the steps down to Stone Bay during the winter too. (Some left by dogs who are encouraged to venture down alone while their slack-bummed owners stay in the warmth of their cars!) I could fill the rest of the page with a string of enraged adjectives and still not properly express how furious this leaves me. TPPS is not one to simply carp however. Four possible solutions are offered in the missive, becoming ever more appealing in ascending order. The council contractor Kingdom, responsible for environmental street enforcement continues to mete out fines. The council and this newspaper makes dog-owners aware of a product known as “Poop Freeze” that makes fecal matter easier to gather (I will spare you the graphic detail in which TPPS explained the theory here). More bins are provided (TPPS has studied the statistics and some of the most prolific dog-fouling offenders, it tells me, live in roads that utilise seagull-proof bags, rather than wheelies. The idea being that if a proper bin were at hand – even if it belonged to someone else – the dog-owner would use it. Although wouldn’t the sort of person decent enough to pick up, I wonder, also carry their fragrant package until they find somewhere suitable to put it?) And finally, our valiant sprayer’s most radical proposal, in which I can see some small snags but which would be undeniably effective: “making examples of” anyone caught not clearing up. “If they were soundly horse whipped in public, and their dog was shot dead on the spot, it could work,” TPPS suggests calmly. “Once word got around…”
I understand there’s a vacancy in the council cabinet right now. TPPS could fit in nicely…
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Jane Wenham-Jones 