West End letters: Chris Howard | Thames Water | out-of-hours emergency | residents | noise

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West End Extra - LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Published: 4 December 2009

Can you hear all that noise from
just across the road?

• FOR those residents unlucky enough to live on boundary roads like myself, I need to highlight an important factor concerning noise issues.
The other night “we” as residents were abruptly woken at 3.15am by road workers from Thames Water who thought it perfectly acceptable to dig up the road. Many residents visited them to voice their concerns, but to no avail. They finally finished and left us to return to our beds at 5am.
Several phone calls were made to the out-of -hours emergency telephone number at Camden, only to be told (what we already knew) Camden does not operate a noise service during the week. No member of the highways team thought it to be a significantly strong reason to visit the site either, so we just had to put up with it.
We have now been woken once more at 1am by cable workers lifting the concrete blocks off the pavement, clanging their tools on the road and shouting to each other. This time the noise was coming from the Westminster side of the street, so I duly telephoned Westminster City Council’s out-of-hours emergency telephone number. I was told it would be raised as a noise complaint and someone would call me back. This did happen and an official explained that even though the noise was coming from his side of the street, he could not act on it, as I was a Camden resident.
I tried to convince him that cross-boundary noise complaints should be handled by himself when the noise was coming from his side of the street, but he was clear and adamant that it was out of his jurisdiction.
I was always of the impression that neighbouring boroughs were meant to assist each other in noise complaints of this nature. Obviously I was wrong.
Isn’t it about time Camden introduced a 24-hour noise service seven days a week? Why is there no funding out of the council tax we pay for a service of this nature? Every other borough in London seems to have this service.
It seems very antiquarian to have to resort to egg throwing or buckets of water to stop noisy workmen operating on a neighbouring borough’s side of the street, but that is the only option we are left with. We phone Camden only to be told no one can come out during the week, we phone Westminster to be told it is out of their hands as we live outside their borough. It’s farcical.
Chris Howard
Gresse Street, Fitzrovia

Send your letters to: The Letters Editor, West End Extra, 40 Camden Road, London, NW1 9DR or email to letters@westendextra.co.uk. The deadline for letters is midday Wednesday. The editor regrets that anonymous letters cannot be published, although names and addresses can be withheld.
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Letters may be edited for reasons of space.

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