Dear LPG,

I have not lived in the Borough of Lewisham for a while although I started my days there, but I do deem myself a relatively young pensioner who has spent a lot of that part of my life after I left, working within its boundaries.   I now have spent most of my adult life living just a few miles down the road in the Borough of Dartford, but even in retirement I seem to stray back to Lewisham quite frequently.

Over the years, as I have passed through both boroughs, I have observed one feature of the streets that are altering their general look for the worse in my opinion. There have always been a mixture of the really beautifully kept front gardens with their flowers and perfect front lawns, the smaller ones with their concrete steps leading to the front door and those that are a little neglected, but I have recently noticed the one residential-street feature which has gradually managed to alter the look of our roads and, I think, not for the better.

I wonder how many other readers are aware of the growth of the number of dustbins in each front garden, and also how many of them are now placed right by the front fence.  Many of my friends are Lewisham residents and every now and then I find the subject of rubbish the topic of conversation.  Their reasoning is no different from ours in Dartford because, regardless If the effort of moving them for the convenience of the dustbin men minimises the effort for the retired, or decreases the time needed for those who do this before getting off to work, it appears to be the ‘done thing’ these days. 

I wonder if I am the only person who remembers when there was only one dustbin in each garden and it was black and blended in with its surroundings.  Now they have the green bin the brown bin and the little silver food bins together with the warnings that if they are not placed at the front of the garden each bin day they will not be collected.  The fortnightly collection is forcing some bins to be left with so much refuse after such a long gap between collections, that by the end of the fortnight the lids just won’t stay down.

I know that this eyesore is designed to improve the way that our waste is dealt with but, never mind the other inconveniences they have caused, from my viewpoint, the visual aspect of their presence can only be regarded as disappointing.

NP, Dartford