I see that Brent have a page on their website which says:
Whilst we are determined to wipe out illegal graffiti, we are aware that some street artists show great artistic talent. StreetCare has sponsored a number of community arts projects. We have been really impressed with the quality of the artwork that has been produced by young people and will continue to sponsor similar projects.
The picture below is an example of the sort of project they’ve sponsored.
It seems to me that this sort of mural art, while drawing on graffiti culture, is significantly different to the idea of legal graffiti walls, where there is little supervision and pictures are changed on a regular basis.
But as this paper from New South Wales points out:
To some however, legal graffiti projects send the wrong message to graffiti writers by encouraging them in their activities and providing them with opportunities to improve their skills which they can then use illegally. Other perceived disadvantages of legal graffiti projects include the fact that such projects do not generally attract taggers who have no interest in graffiti as art (nor would this strategy be useful in relation to political, humorous, racist graffiti) and that writers may only be diverted from illegal activity for a short time.
The reading I’ve done suggests there the evidence on whether legal walls and mural projects have an effect on the level of illegal graffiti and tagging is uncertain and that where they are introduced there can be strong feelings against the projects.
Has anyone seen anything they think is definative on this question?
Understanding the performance indicators that local government are using to measure the cleanliness of our streets is important for us. It helps make sure that our product can capture information that our partners need to improve their performance.
Since last year councils have been measuring the amounts of graffiti and flyposting alongside the amount of litter and detritus on our streets. The Guidance on BVPI 199 sets out why:
Reducing unacceptable levels of graffiti and flyposting forms a key part of Government’s Cleaner Safer Greener Communities Programme and these indicators are included as part of ODPM’s [now DCLG] PSA 8 on Liveability. Through the improved management information delivered to authorities by the indicator, they should aim to reduce the score year on year.
Later the guidance expands on the argument:
A street can be Grade A for litter and detritus and still appear dirty and uncared for because of the many other local environmental quality factors that come into play. Whilst the indicator cannot include all of these factors, it has been expanded to include three that we know impact on people’s perception of the local environment.
Local authorities will be measured against the percentage of sites surveyed where graffiti and flyposting falls below Grade B (see below for an idea of what Grade B looks like).
At the moment there aren’t any formal targets for reducing the number of incidents of graffiti and flyposting, but it now makes up part of PSA 8 and as the guideance points out:
Local Public Service Agreements (LPSAs) negotiated between local and central government often include reference to targets for improving local environmental quality and the expanded indicator can be used to help inform these.
Here’s what Ingrid over at Partnership Place has to say about our partners in Lewisham:
I just spotted this website today - Love Lewisham. Residents can post pictures of what’s broken in Lewisham (e.g. graffitti, abandoned cars, broken street furniture) as a way of reporting it to the council to get it fixed. I think this is a fantastic idea. I would upload pictures to a similar website for my local council. It would also seem like this is a great way to help council services prioritise which jobs need to be done first - because public servants can see what’s in the worst nick.
But the website isn’t just about showing pictures of what’s broken, but what’s been done to fix them. Many of the pictures have additional details, including what action was taken and before and after shots
She’s got links to a couple of graffiti stories.
From This is Broken which describes itself as a “project to make businesses more aware of their customer experience, and how to fix it”:
The Love Lewisham website allows citizens to submit pictures of “broken” things in their community, to alert the local government for need of a fix.
I’m pleased to see they’ve filed this under “not broken”.
