Published: Thursday, 3rd July, 2008 08:45
'Yobs are making our lives a misery'
By Adam Hewitt
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ANTI-SOCIAL hotspots in Earley have flared up as the summer nights have drawn out.
Laurel Park has borne the recent brunt of yobbish behaviour, and night after night of noise, vandalism and graffiti prompted Wokingham Borough Council to close the car park there on advice from police.
Resident Barbara Bennett said: “These teenagers congregate in the car park and play areas, there’s all that graffiti and it’s got worse in the last month. Motorbikes charge up and down the road, sometimes until past midnight.”
With the car park closed, law-abiding drivers had to park on the surrounding streets even in the daytime, but the police re-opened the gates on Thursday for a two-week trial. If the problems return, the barrier will come down again.
Resident Tony Tarr, 52, said: “Somebody is going to get hurt one day, they fly up and down the alleyway on bikes and people are fed up. The PCSOs come and break them up but they just come back again.”
Another resident, who asked to remain anonymous, talked about masses of broken bottles and seeing ambulances having to treat teens who were too drunk to stand.
He added: “Opening and closing the barriers isn’t the solution. They just pull up next to the barriers in their cars, and the mopeds can just get past it on the pavement anyway. They need to realise this is not an area to congregate in, they’re making our lives a misery.”
Elsewhere in the town, police have been called three nights in the past week because teenagers in cars near Earley Station keep harassing a man who spends nights in his Vauxhall Astra. The man, who does not want to be named, has been a target for verbal abuse, stone and bottle throwing, sometimes as late as 3am.
Neighbours who are woken have passed on car numbers to the police, and spokeswoman Andrea Bennett said: “No arrests have been made, but investigations are continuing. Police officers have also been talking with the man to try to resolve the issue and make sure he’s safe.”
- COUNCILLORS, youth workers and others have tried to tackle the town’s problems, but with limited success so far.
Plans for a BMX track in Lower Earley have hit virtually unanimous opposition from nearby residents concerned that it will create a new anti-social hotspot rather than deterring yobs from congregating on the streets.
Cutting down hedges at Sol Joel Park has improved the situation there, but further afield at the town’s police surgeries, the growing popularity of mopeds is a constant complaint.
Other solutions include a youth project called The Garage at the Salvation Army Hall in Chalfont Close, which has restarted after a three-year break. It runs on Fridays at 7.30pm, giving teenagers a safe place to play football and basketball, watch television and play on a Nintendo Wii console.
Dean Jones, from the Salvation Army, said teenagers needed more to do and added: “The project has had a quiet start but we now want to get more people in and build up what we offer. Our aim is to provide a safe and vibrant place for young people to get together and have fun and to offer them an opportunity for a life of purpose.”
But nearby residents said the youths causing the most trouble were the hardest to reach with such projects.
Anyone with concerns can contact Earley’s neighbourhood policing team via 0845 8505 505.
For more on the BMX track plans see:
http://www.readingchronicle.co.uk/articles/1/3404
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Gaza protest in town centre