Smashing stuff - update

Someone - I am assuming Council - cleaned up this smashed pay phone very quickly. I reported it after 5pm on Thursday, and by 7am on Friday, the pay phone had been wrapped in warning tape and all the glass on the footpath had been swept up.

They didn't get all the glass - some was left on the road and in the bike lane - but the turnaround time was quite amazing.

Smashing stuff

A Telstra pay phone tonight - a car went over the kerb and smashed the advertising screen on the back of it. Might have been an impatient driver who didn't want to wait for someone turning right, went around them and found that the road wasn't wide enough. The police turned up, and a tow truck took the car away.

Result - broken glass all over the footpath and road.

The impact must have been fairly hard, as glass was sprayed a good 10 metres down the road.

The owner of the car isn't going to clean up all that glass. The police won't do it either, or the tow truck driver. Lot's of people had a look at the glass when I went past, but no one seemed inclined to do anything about it.

I've emailed these photos to Council, along with the location. They'll probably have it cleaned up tomorrow. If you don't tell them about it, how can they take care of it?

Telstra partly clean up their act

For a long time, the most heavily vandalised site in Five Dock has been the Telstra exchange. It's been an eyesore for as long as I have lived here, and Telstra has been consistent in their resistance to doing anything about it. If a building is vandalised, Telstra's own internal policies say that the graffiti should be painted out once a year - but this site has not been cleaned since at least May 2008, when I first contacted Telstra and asked them to do something about it.

Imagine my amazement when I drove past it earlier this week and found that the front wall had received a coat of white paint.

It's only a single coat of thin paint, and at close range the graffiti is still visible under the paint, but it's a start. They haven't done anything about the graffiti on the building itself - they've only removed perhaps 1/3 of what needs removing. But the most egregious part is gone.

I hope we don't have to wait another 18 months for them to tackle the next bit of graffiti on the building.

It is of course possible that Telstra had nothing to do with it, and either Council or someone else got sick of it and painted the wall themselves.

The stupidity of just painting the wall and leaving graffiti elsewhere is that the remaining graffiti acts like a bit, fat tempting target to vandals. It is the equivalent of a "kick me" sign.

Telstra amazes with their turnaround time

I reported a badly vandalised public phone booth to Telstra on Wednesday morning. I drove past it yesterday morning - and it was clean! Amazing - less than 24 hours to remove offensive graffiti. I feel silly for taking 18 days to report it. I won't be so slack next time.

I will give Telstra a qualified thumbs up. It's great that they responded so quickly - now, if they could just get around to cleaning up their vandalised exchange buildings....

Reporting graffiti to Telstra

I finally got around to reporting graffiti on a phone booth today that I first spotted on 2 May. Even though Telstra staff or a contractor have probably visited that phone during that time to empty out the cash, I doubt anyone has bothered to report it.

A timeline for you:

11:18:30 - Rang 13 22 03 and listened to some interminable messages. Chose option 3.

11:19:00 - spoke to an operator, found that I had gone through to the wrong department. Put on hold.

11:20:40 - operator found the department that I needed to speak to, put me through.

11:21:40 - finally got to where I needed to be, gave them the details. I couldn't give them the phone number as it was unreadable under the spray paint.

11:23:00 - call complete.

Four and a half minutes - not bad. It's taken me 20 minutes in the past to get through to Australia Post, which is why I now only log problems via their web site. I'm still surprised that Telstra only allow you to log faults over the phone. Given that they are also a huge internet company, it seems odd that they don't give you a web based option. I'm sure I could log a problem via the web in less than 4 1/2 minutes, which would make me more likely to get around to reporting it sooner, rather than 18 days later.

Telstra funeral notices

A number of recent acts of vandalism around Five Dock mention the elusive "Steph".  Some, like this one, seem to point to Steph being dead, whilst others proclaim that Steph is using ice and sexually available.  

Thank goodness for mobile phones.  

This phone box does have some information on it that tells you how to report graffiti, but there is graffiti over the top of part of it making it unreadable.  Telstra employ someone - either an employee or a contractor - to collect cash from this phone on a regular basis.  Does that person bother reporting graffiti when they find it, or they just take the money and run, leaving the graffiti reporting to somebody else?

Telstra showing interest

On Wednesday, I blogged that I had made contact with a manager from Telstra with regard to the mess on the Five Dock exchange on Great North Road.  They were out of the office for a few days, but promised to check up on it on Friday if I emailed them the details.

They rang on Friday to say that they'd reviewed my email and the case numbers that I had submitted, and that they would be right onto it.  

I sent them this link, where I posted photos showing what the exchange looks like.  It's not a good look.  I'm hoping that the photos will help produce the desired result.

Telstra followup

I have been trying since April to get Telstra to clean up their blighted exchange in Five Dock.  I've written to Sol Trujillo, logged two requests with the company responsible for maintaining the exchange buildings, corresponded with our Federal MP and dealt with our Deputy Mayor.  

Back in October, we seemed to be making progress.  Our Deputy Mayor had met with a Telstra representative and they agreed to "community remediation", which is a term I don't understand - but is sounded good.

The Telstra rep has since moved on, and the problem has been passed to someone else at Telstra.  I rang that someone else today, and had a good chat with them about the issue.  I've emailed them the history of this case, since there was no handover, and I guess the whole process will start from scratch again.

At least the problem now belongs to someone at Telstra.  It is no longer somebody else's problem.

A tale of seven letters

Over the last month or so, I have recieved 5 responses from a variety of government bodies.  The purpose of this post is to compare and contrast the different responses, and the actions of the various bodies.

I'll start with the good - the RTA.  The RTA keeps it short and simple.  I logged a short request via their website, and got this response a few weeks later via email.  Postage costs of zero, minimal time spent in writing to them, and minimal time and expense for the RTA to respond - as a taxpayer, I like that.  The outcome was also good - the RTA (or their contractors) usually do a good job of painting over graffiti.  They don't always get all of it (missing out a few small bits here and there), but they take care of the great bulk of it.  The difference between before and after is marked.

Ref: GE08/5731

Dear 

I refer to your e-mail regarding the graffiti on the pedestrian bridge over the City West Link,Charles Street, Lillyfield.

The graffiti has now been removed.

Thank you for bringing this matter to the attention of the RTA.

Kind regards

RTA Customer Services

The next response is from Sydney Water.  This was quite unexpected, and it made me smile - letters like this make me feel like I am doing something worthwhile.  I take my hat off to Sydney Water for being so honest and forthright - many government agencies would be tempted to fudge the facts and send back a mealy-mouthed response, but Sydney Water has done the right thing, and my respect for them has gone up enormously.  They've recognised that they had a problem, and they're working on fixing it.  As much as it's nice to get an apology, I care much more that they are looking into their system and seeking to improve it.

Then we have RailCorp.  This letter is just bad.  Consider the following responses:

RailCorp takes the problem of graffiti on the rail corridor seriously and will urgently attend to an incident if it compromises safety or common decency.

That's a lovely motherhood statement, but it has no bearing on the bridge in question.  Safety or common decency is not compromised in this case, so they don't have to do anything about it.  It says nothing about when this bridge will be cleaned - if ever.  

Then there is the next paragraph:

RailCorp shares the responsibility for their maintenance with other stakeholders such as local councils and the RTA.  External bridge walls and roadside surfaces are cleaned by these organisations due to the need to close roads and section off these areas whereas RailCorp attends to areas within the corridor itself.

I know that.  I was a party to the negotiations between RTA and RAC (as it was back then) to divide up responsibility between the two bodies for bridge maintenance.  I had a small part in helping to write the policy on the rail side.  

However, note that all the graffiti in question that I have been writing about is on the bridge itself - it's on the area that is a RailCorp responsibility.  Talking about other stakeholders such as the RTA and local councils simply fudges the issue.  They have no bearing on this case.  It is an exercise in blame shifting or responsibility shifting, and I'm afraid I have written enough of this nonsense in the past to see right through it.  It sounds good, but it means nothing.

As the rail corridor needs to be closed for safety reasons during cleaning, these areas are usually cleaned at the same time as trackwork closedowns.

That much is true.  I have done plenty of work alongside running rail lines in the past to know all about that.  I've done the trackside awareness safety course.  I've worked with the maintenance people who go out and work on the track.  I've worked with the bridge engineers who do the bridge inspections, and even the engineers who wrote the bridge inspection checklists.  I setup the document management system that was used for the writing of a new generation of infrastructure management documentation.

As for closedowns, a project was setup to roll out Primavera as the project management software for planning and running these closedowns.  I know about that, because I built the servers for the pilot and installed Primavera on them and worked with the project team to get it up and running.  In my reply, I asked for the date of the next closedown on this stretch of track, and an assurance that cleaning the bridge was part of the work package.  

I doubt I will get a direct response - in all my letters to RailCorp, I have asked simple and direct questions, and never had a proper answer to any of them.  The RailCorp letter writers are very good at obscuring the issues and avoiding the questions whilst appearing to give an answer of substance.

For some unfathomable reason, someone at RailCorp just doesn't want to remove the graffiti from this bridge.  It might be an issue of cost, or the difficulty and complexity of arranging a closedown to do the work, or that they have higher priority things to do.  It might also be that due to the lack of rail traffic on this line, they are treating it as a "dead" line and don't want to spend a cent on it if they can help it.  Whatever the reason, RailCorp are not being honest and upfront about their reasons.

The fourth letter is from Australia Post.  I find this letter slightly disturbing - the implication is that if I continue to ask for graffiti to be removed from post-boxes, they'll start removing them because they are too expensive to clean.  You might read that as a veiled threat to shut up and stop contacting them, or I'll be responsible for the removal of the postal service from some areas.

As far as I am concerned, if a post-box is not used, they are free to take it out.  No sense in retaining uneconomic assets if they are not required. With a network of 14,000 post-boxes, I'd think they'd be removing hundreds each year (and also installing hundreds in new suburbs as they spring up).  

That said, I can't see how cleaning them can be so unbelievably expensive that it would warrant their removal on economic grounds.  I can buy 1 litre of metho from my local supermarket for under $4.  Having cleaned graffiti off a few signs in our area, I estimate that a 1 litre bottle should be enough to clean 100 post-box sides (if it was vandalised on four sides, one bottle would do 25 post-boxes etc).  That works out at under 4 cents per side.  You could throw in the cost of a rag if need be.  The labour cost is not that high, given that I have found that I can remove a large tag from a street sign in about 10 seconds.  

If they are using diamond encrusted rags with gold-infused metho, I could understand that it might cost a few dollars to clean up a post-box.  Otherwise, I find this talk of the "significant cost" in cleaning post-boxes to be insulting.  If the management of Australia Post can't find a cheap way to clean graffiti from post-boxes, then maybe we need to replace some managers with more competent managers.

This letter also says that Australia Post will "continue to undertake both scheduled and ad hoc cleaning of our facilities", but I have seen no evidence to date that Australia Post has a system in place to ensure that scheduled cleaning is undertaken.  
The fifth letter is from Ashfield Council.  I like this letter.  The GM has acknowledged that they have a problem, that they want to do something about it and that they are striving to do better in future.  I've noticed that since my first letter, the response of Ashfield Council has improved, so this letter is not a lot of fluff and hot air - it is the genuine article.

RailCorp and Australia Post could learn a lot from Ashfield Council, the RTA and Sydney Water, which is why I have posted all the responses here.  Clearly, some organisations are better led, and their staff more committed, than others.

That's five letters - where are the other two?

I have written to Telstra on a number of occasions, and never had a response from anyone.  I've also written to Energy Australia a few times, and whilst the first few letters generated a response, I've heard nothing from them in months.  I guess they think that if they ignore me, I'll forget about them and go away.

Unfortunately for Energy Australia, since they are a government corporation, they are responsible to a Minister - and I'll be writing to that Minister today to ask them to chase up a response on my behalf.  

Does Australia Post give a damn?

I fired off a snarky letter to Australia Post yesterday (don't you love the irony of having to pay for a stamp - giving money to the company that is the problem - to complain about their actions), and I felt that I should back it up with some evidence.

So, here goes.

A two for one!

These were all spotted in the course of one hour today.  There are 14,000 post-boxes scattered across this wide brown land - how many others are in a disgraceful state like these?

Telstra - still thumb twiddling part II

Once again, I have visited the Telstra exchange in Concord to find that it is still a complete mess.

Note that this "Your rights at work" sticker has been stuck over the top of a bit of graffiti.  Now, assuming that this sticker was put there by a unionised Telstra employee, I find it hard to fathom why they could apply the sticker and then fail to report the graffiti that it's covering up.

Personally, I hate seeing this type of political agitprop on public assets (then again, Telstra is now a private company, so I guess it is up to them what policies they apply in regard to employees sticking non-corporate propaganda on their assets).

Telstra - really caring for their assets

I have blogged about this phone booth in Concord several times before.  I rang Telstra and asked them to clean it up, and this was the response.

It appears that the cleaning process has removed the graffiti, but it has had the side effect of removing the underlying paint as well.  If I was in charge of Telstra's Marketing Dept, I'd have a fit over this.  Telstra are trying to promote a whizz-bang image with their 3G network, but phone booths like this make them look decidedly haphazard and useless.  

OK, so the cleaning process wrecked the signage - that's life.  But the least the cleaner could have done is report it, and ask for some new signage to be installed!  Is it that difficult?   Are people really that thick?

Telstra - still thumb twiddling

It's now 5 weeks since Telstra agreed to "community remediation" (a term that I still don't understand), and the Exchange in Five Dock still looks like a dog's breakfast.

Note the presence of not one, but two Telstra vehicles out the front.  It's not like Telstra can claim that they are unaware of the graffiti all over their building, since there are Telstra staff working from there most days.

The Exchange appears to be acting as a magnet still for graffiti on surrounding properties.  This wall is opposite the exchange - it was repainted recently, and it has been  hit again and again and again.  If Telstra clean up their act, it might reduce the damage to this property as well.

How long does it take Telstra to clean a phone box?

I spotted this vandalised phone box back in July.  I went through the rigmarole of reporting it to Telstra, and was given reference number 128869378 and told that it would be cleaned within 48 hours.

From Telstra

Here it is again on 26 August - 6 weeks later.  Looks like someone has blown their 48 hour service level agreement on getting it cleaned.

Just for interest, this is how this phone box looked when the Google Earth street view people went past and took a photo.  I have no idea when they took it, but I presume it was prior to me going past in July.

Now consider this - people pay for phone calls in these phone boxes by inserting coins into a pay phone.  Over time, the coin box on the phone fills up, and someone (usually a contractor) turns up to empty the coin box.  I have no idea how often that happens, but let's say it's at least once a fortnight.

This is all part of my usual gripe that assets like this are serviced or visited on a regular basis, but the people doing the visiting never seem to notice the graffiti; if they do, they don't seem to be bothering to report it.

These same people probably knock off work at the end of the day, go home and when they get to their own suburb, drive around going, "Look at all this horrible graffiti all over the place".  Somehow, there is a major disconnect in their brains between their duty to report graffiti and their frustration and annoyance as a private citizen.

Barnwell Park golf club - followup

Back around 9 July, I made a few phone calls to see if I could get the graffiti on the equipment cabinet (in the red box below) cleaned off.  As I noted back then, I was given a bit of a run around, and had little confidence that anything would ever be done about it.  

The thing is, the golf club building in the photo belongs to Canada Bay Council, but the equipment cabinet attached to it belongs to Telstra.  Although Council has a graffiti cleaning truck, they can't touch the cabinet, even though it is on their land and attached to their building.

Madness?  I will leave that to you to decide.

From Barnwell Park...

The gist of what I was told was that Telstra would have to take care of getting the graffiti removed.  Now I have had several dealings with Telstra to date, and none of them have been successful. 

However, I went past yesterday, and some blotchy paint had been applied over the graffiti.  I would prefer to see blotchy paint rather than graffiti, and I'd prefer to see it a month after first reporting it rather than never.  Something is better than nothing.

Telstra Exchange, Concord

The library below has 8 photos of another vandalised Telstra Exchange - this time in Yaralla Rd, Concord.

Telstra Exchange, Concord

When I was out and about yesterday, I saw a BigPond van by the side of the road, so I stopped and had a chat with the technician who was getting some tools out of the van. I asked him whether he ever worked in the Five Dock Exchange (yes) and if he knew how to report vandalism internally within Telstra (no).

I might as well have asked him the chemical composition of cheese.

I then suggested that he should ask his manager about it, which he agreed to do - as his Team Leader works from the Five Dock Exchange almost every day.

Now I don't want to get this bloke in trouble, because he was just being honest. It had never occured to him to report the state that the exchange is in, probably figuring that it was somebody else's problem, such as his Team Leader.

It will be interesting to see whether his Team Leader has any more luck reporting the graffiti. Telstra must have a policy or process for dealing with graffiti on their intranet - if I can do a search on the Canada Bay Council website and find their policy and procedure in just a few seconds, then it shouldn't be that hard for a Telstra employee to do the same thing on their intranet.

Assuming they have a policy and procedure that is.

Telstra - another update

I was contacted by John Murphy's office last week and told that they had passed on this problem to Neil Kenzler, the Deputy Mayor of Canada Bay.  I think Neil drew the short end of the stick because he has dealt with Telstra before over getting the exchange on Lyons Rd cleaned up.

I went past today and there was a BigPond van out the front - presumably a technician was inside installing a line card or doing an upgrade to some equipment.  Given that the technician had to walk past all that graffiti out the front, you'd think that at some point they might have noticed it and thought about reporting it.

Yes, I got a laugh out of that as well.

I'm looking forward to seeing what Telstra propose to do about this mess.  Even more so, I want to know about the process that they are going to put in place to ensure that this sort of thing does not happen again.  Given that their technicians are visiting this site on a regular basis, it should not come down to a member of the public having to report graffiti before they will clean it up.  

Telstra - update

This photo shows a Telstra ute outside the exchange on Great North Road.  My understanding is that these exchanges are fully automated these days, and so no one works in them unless there is a problem that can't be fixed remotely, or new equipment has to be installed.

But someone from Telstra still has to visit from time to time, which means they should be seeing the graffiti all over the building, and they should be reporting it back through their management so that it can be cleaned up.

I got an email today from John Murphy's office to say that Telstra have agreed to a "community involved solution", although I am unsure what that means.  I'd be happy if it just involved one painter and a bucket of paint.

How Telstra don't fix graffiti

I took this photo on 9 July, and reported the vandalised telephone booth to Telstra shortly afterwards.

At the time, they said it would be cleaned up within 48 hours.

This is how it looked today, one month later.  

Either a very cunning vandal has sprayed exactly the same graffiti on the back on the phone booth, or Telstra have not lifted a finger.

Telstra - follow up

I went past the Telstra exchange on Great North Road again today to see if it had been cleaned up yet.

Nope.  No progress.  Not even using the good offices of John Murphy MP has had an impact on Telstra.

When I last went past this site on around 15 July, I spotted the Council graffiti removal truck going up the laneway.  

Well, the truck must have come back at some point as the old bowling club opposite the Telstra Exchange has been cleaned up to a reasonable extent.  Note the nice grey wall, which was previously covered in graffiti.

Also note though that the Energy Australia substation has not been cleaned up.  As I discovered recently, Councils have been approaching Energy Australia and asking permission to clean their substations - and Energy Australia has been knocking them back.  You therefore end up in a situation like this where the Council cleans up 90% of the graffiti, but is legally held back from cleaning up the remaining 10%.  That 10% of course just attracts more graffiti back over the entire area, leading to another cleanup at the ratepayer's expense.

I will making enquiries to try and discover why Energy Australia is being so bloody-minded, and whether that attitude can be turned around.