Weeds verging on the ridiculous

[megilleland]

Can no one at Balfour Beatty and our councillors see the state of our urban roads in the city which are now getting out of hand. When the use of a garden hoe along the kerb would have removed most weeds we are now in a position that the weeds are so established that the only way to treat them would be with herbicides which in turn cause pollution. So the only answer appears to be is do nothing and our streets on our estates take on the appearance of an outback town - the only thing missing is tumbleweed. Together with the inability to get on top of the litter and fly tipping problems and blocked drains around the area it is apparent that the majority of citizens and those elected to represent us have no pride in our environment - a sad state of affairs. The picture of Glastonbury Festival and the accompanying litter say so much about the state of our country and mindset of those responsible.

In Australia they appear to have come up with a safe, pesticide-free method of keeping their streets clean and tidy. And ironically  this method is used by Glastonbury Town Council to keep their town clean and weed free.

 

Belmont Road Hereford:

[twowheelsgood]

All available funds this year appear to have been invested in several tins of white road lining paint - there's been an outbreak of white line renewal throughout the City - seemingly regardless of the potholes and the general crumbling surfaces it is being applied to. Complete madness. Once again - what are our ward councillors doing about it?

[Denise Lloyd]

Yes and the longer it is all left the bigger the problem to get back into an acceptable state.  Any gardener will know leave a garden for a couple of months - a jungle that takes a lot of getting back in hand.  

[Colin James]

OMG, I was about to post a topic on this very subject today. I took these pictures to show how bad they have become! I will add a photo to your original topic so it's appears on the front page if that is ok.

 

 

 

[Paul Jones]

The weeds and general litter in Hereford is in a pretty poor state. I don't think I have seen so many weeds and some have grown so high that they look like mini tree's's and are left alone altogether.

[Victor Wright]

Hereford is one of the worst places around for weeds and everything is just overgrown, it is like this every year and they want to put a tree boulevard down Belmont Rd, joke!

[K.Butt]

It is the same along the Ross Road, overgrown and weeds and litter all over the place. Why are BB not spraying weedkiller? 

[Denise Lloyd]

Balfour Beatty used a weed killer a couple of years ago that turned the ground blue where they had sprayed. Because of the number of complaints about how ugly it looked they abandoned that idea.  Because of various regulations weed killer is not as powerful as it used to be so needs to be applied on a regular basis.  BB do not do anything on a regular basis so spraying would be a waste of money the only answer is the old labourous method of pulling the weeds out.  Perhaps some of the Ward Councillors could take the supposed big wigs of the Council on a little trip out and about so that they can see just how bloody awful Herefordshire looks.  I see on FB they are moaning about the state of the Castle Pool area. 

 

I think they are building a couple of houses near to that tree the activity may well have disturbed the roots - just make sure if sorry when the traffic is held up near there try not to hang about!

[Colin James]

Balfour Beatty used a weed killer a couple of years ago that turned the ground blue where they had sprayed. Because of the number of complaints about how ugly it looked they abandoned that idea.  Because of various regulations weed killer is not as powerful as it used to be so needs to be applied on a regular basis.  BB do not do anything on a regular basis so spraying would be a waste of money the only answer is the old labourous method of pulling the weeds out.  Perhaps some of the Ward Councillors could take the supposed big wigs of the Council on a little trip out and about so that they can see just how bloody awful Herefordshire looks.  I see on FB they are moaning about the state of the Castle Pool area. 

 

I think they are building a couple of houses near to that tree the activity may well have disturbed the roots - just make sure if sorry when the traffic is held up near there try not to hang about!

 

There are no new houses, they have just sold the one on the front and the land at the back is for sale or has just been sold however, these roots have damaged this wall years ago, this is not something recent but it is getting worse and no signs of the tree's being reduced in size or trimmed back either

[megilleland]

Here are some photos I took this morning in Newton Farm and Hunderton.

 

[Denise Lloyd]

The weeds look more healthy than the ones we have here must have had more rain! It is truly awful perhaps our re-elected MP would like to get involved.

 

Colin my mistake I thought there was planning behind this house from memory it is 156 Belmont Road must have my bearings wrong - old age eh!

[Colin James]

I walked across the Old Bridge this evening and it is a disgrace! Our Old Bridge is the picture that represents Hereford on postcards etc...

 

 

[megilleland]

One of the worst weeds in urban areas is Buddleia seen in railway locations, check out Hereford Station, and found establishing itself on buildings and now in kerbs

 

.

 

Here is a fine specimen attached to the cornice on the old Chadds store in Commercial Street adding further to the blight which is creeping up this street.

[twowheelsgood]

BBLP's overall written strategy is a 'reactive' one ie do nothing until something happens. That something may be a complaint at one end of the scale to a serious incident at the other. Either way, until that wall falls over or those blocked gullies flood someone's property or cause a crash, nothing will be done. Of course, our Council tax will continue to be aggressively collected regardless. Whilst most people can see the folly of this approach and would prefer 'a stitch in time', our Councillors have decided that is the way the BBLP contract will be run. Year after year we see the City decline further in a seemingly endless downward spiral. Yes, some socially minded people get together from time to time and tidy up a small area, but they can never address the overall picture, nor should they have to - that is what we pay Council tax for and that is why we elect councillors to act in our best interest. It's a well documented scenario that the more run down an area becomes, the more vandalism and crime it attracts. The gap between the £20 MILLION pounds we pay BBLP every YEAR and what is being done on the ground seems to be getting wider on a logarithmic scale, yet councillors roll over, keep their heads down and do nothing. You have to wonder why.

 

For all its faults, the OLM development is kept spotlessly clean by a small team - it doesn't take much because it's done all day every day - a stitch in time.

[Clarkester]

All available funds this year appear to have been invested in several tins of white road lining paint - there's been an outbreak of white line renewal throughout the City - seemingly regardless of the potholes and the general crumbling surfaces it is being applied to. Complete madness. Once again - what are our ward councillors doing about it?

I completely agree TWG, I went for a bike ride last weekend, along the Rotherwas Link road there had been newly repainted white lines...  On top of lumps of mud from farm vehicles...

It was a nice touch I thought...

[twowheelsgood]

Hereford's £3m flagship Greenway bridge, opened by Cllr Chappell in Dec 2013, has not had a single penny spent on it since. It's covered in graffiti, dog mess, mould and weeds. Once again, why aren't the ward councillor/s demanding some action? Chose how you move, but be careful where you walk/cycle and try not to read the very large and very offensive graffiti. I also had to dodge an idiot on a motorbike this evening.

[Aylestone Voice]

What is it about dog owners in Bartonsham and Hampton Park?

I use Great Western Way very often and despite it being a dog walking area and running through areas often, wrongly, looked down on by those who live north of the river, hardly ever is the dog mess on it - even on the bridges. 

And yet those owners in this area cannot be arsed to either get their dog off the bridge before it craps or clear up their mess. It is not as if there is nowhere for their dogs to crap nearby.

Perhaps they are just arrogant imbeciles?

[Colin James]

On 06/07/2017 at 22:38, twowheelsgood said:

Hereford's £3m flagship Greenway bridge, opened by Cllr Chappell in Dec 2013, has not had a single penny spent on it since. It's covered in graffiti, dog mess, mould and weeds. Once again, why aren't the ward councillor/s demanding some action? Chose how you move, but be careful where you walk/cycle and try not to read the very large and very offensive graffiti. I also had to dodge an idiot on a motorbike this evening.

Unbelievable that is has been allowed to fall in such a state!  I will need to go down and have a closer look.

[Adrian symonds]

There are mini trees growing out of the side of the College Bridge,  and on the sides of the roads, it is a disgrace. I wonder how long it will be before we see weeds growing on the road to nowhere? 

[twowheelsgood]

Another picture of the neglected Greenway. The tiles at the join are loose - a couple of have been replaced/refixed after much complaining as they were badly done at the outset. They're mostly all loose now.

[Victor Wright]

Hereford in Bloom 

[K.Butt]

Hereford in Bloom 

 

ha ha that is funny and would of been a great headline. 

[Chris Chappell]

Savings, savings, savings in the budget is preventing a full weeding of all city and town roads and footpaths. However a number of community 'gardening' sessions take place in every Ward, please contact your local ward councillor for when you can help with the next. You do not have to do it at a set time!

No point in moaning about it, please volunteer to get rid of the weeds in your patch. Thanks to government cuts in subsidies, LAs, across the country are cutting back on unesentials, weeding is not essential compared with social care although they are not same budget.!,

[megilleland]

Savings, savings, savings in the budget is preventing a full weeding of all city and town roads and footpaths. However a number of community 'gardening' sessions take place in every Ward, please contact your local ward councillor for when you can help with the next. You do not have to do it at a set time!

No point in moaning about it, please volunteer to get rid of the weeds in your patch. Thanks to government cuts in subsidies, LAs, across the country are cutting back on unesentials, weeding is not essential compared with social care although they are not same budget.!,

 

Taken from Herefordshire Council's website:

 

Balfour Beatty Living Places contract

 

The council’s public realm contract for providing services includes highways, public rights of way, parks and open spaces, street cleaning and street lighting.

 

Balfour Beatty were awarded the contract in 2013 and the procurement for the contract set out to achieve the following objectives:

 

* Ensuring our roads, public open spaces and streets are accessible, safe, clean and well-maintained

* Maintaining the delivery of essential services

* Achieving value for money, facilitated by process improvement and transparency through open book accounting

* Achieving service delivery which is efficient and responsive to local needs and priorities and

* Contributing to the regeneration of the economy and social capital in Herefordshire

 

Obviously they have seriously failed and we can see the result all over the city. Maybe the contract needs reviewing. It would appear the money from council tax payers to do this work has been diverted to shareholders pockets.

 

[Steve Major]

I am fed up of hearing people blaming the government for everything. The council have the money, I know that my community charges have gone up and they managed to find the money to extend and upgrade the planning office in Blueschool Street  but can't find the money to kill weeds, yeah right. What do you mean it is no good moaning about it, go and remove them ourselves? You will be telling us next that we have to arrest the local burglars ourselves. 

[Denise Lloyd]

Is it Belmont PC that has huge sums of money in their account why do they not spend a bit of it in hiring somebody to get their area cleared up rather than rely on volunteers who are already paying over the odds in Council Tax for what? The same goes for the parish that Greenway comes under which I suspect is Dinmore.

 

Volunteers are what the name suggests not a means of free labour! 

[megilleland]

It would be a good idea if everyone kept the area outside their own house clean.

[Steve Major]

It would be a good idea if everyone kept the area outside their own house clean.

 

Yes I agree, we were only looking outside some of the houses along Belmont Road over the weekend while driving past and had the same thoughts. I have noticed an old lady often sweeping up the leaves and rubbish outside her gate on many occasions, nice to see.

[Denise Lloyd]

Yep the same thoughts passed through my mind

[H.Wilson]

Hereford in Bloom 

lol good one