From time to time street lights fail, street furniture gets damaged or litter builds up in Long Leys. LLRA encourages residents to report problems of this type directly to service providers where possible (usually the city or county council customer service teams); it is the fastest way of getting the problem resolved and allows the service provider to get a first hand report on the specific problem and provide a follow up on any actions taken.
To help, below is a list of useful contacts for various service providers who have responsibilities in the Long Leys area; please scan through this list to find the closest match to your problem. When reporting problems do mention the specific location of the problem or nearest street address (Lincolnshire County Council covers an area of around 2,500 square miles) and if possible a photo will also help service providers to assess what needs to be done without visiting the site.
If you have difficulty in getting the problem resolved or there seems to be a wider ongoing issue then please either contact LLRA at LLRA@long-leys.org or one of the local councillors listed below. Where LLRA get queries on problems they will also be posted on this page in the comments section, along with any response from LLRA committee members.
Useful Contacts
Lincolnshire County Council
- Customer Services Team Tel: 01522 782060
- Email: customer_services@lincolnshire.gov.uk
- Online reporting:
- Online roadworks information (key in postcode to view)
- Useful direct numbers
- Highways: 01522 782070
- Street Lighting: 01522 782070
- Elected councillor
- Neil Murray, 07971 569662 cllrn.murray@lincolnshire.gov.uk
City of Lincoln Council
- Switchboard Tel: 01522 881188
- City Council (out of hours): 01522 873424
- Email: customer.services@lincoln.gov.uk
- Website: lincoln.gov.uk/contact-1
- Useful direct numbers
- Anti-Social Behaviour Team: 01522 873431
- Street Cleaning/Littering/Refuse collection/Flytipping reports: 01522 873423
- Environmental Heath: 01522 873249
- Bus Passes: 01522 873431
- Elected councillors for Carholme Ward
- Neil Murray 07971 569662 neil.murray@lincoln.gov.uk
- Lucinda Preston 07543 703311 lucinda.preston@lincoln.gov.uk
- Emily Wood 07544 072240 Emily.Wood@lincoln.gov.uk
Neighbourhood Policing Team
- Email: lincolncarholme@lincs.pnn.police.uk
- Crime statistics for Carholme ward
- 999 in an emergency
- 101 non emergency
Anglian Water
- 24hr water/wastewater: 08457 145145
- View latest issues
Barratt/David Wilson Homes North Midlands
- Responsible for maintenance of fence by Higson Steps and grass cutting within the St George’s estate
- Customer Care Team tel: 0115 900 7575
- Email: northmidlands@newhomecare.co.uk
Lincoln City MP
- Karl McCartney 020 7219 3000 karl.mccartney.mp@parliament.uk
Other Residents Associations
Higson Road Steps:
Handrails: Can you please report the missing handrails, some are reusable and lying nearby. I mentioned this before the first snow and since then we’ve had another lot but as of today still nothing. A kind resident has fixed one on the slope part. If you let me know when it’s been reported I can give you weekly updates
This was reported to Lincolnshire County Council Customer Services Team Tel: 01522 782060 on 29 November 2017 with photos of problem. Re-reported to County Council 3 April 2018 to Customer_Services@Lincolnshire.gov.uk. ref no 101000276525. Awaiting response/action from council highways team.
11 April 2018: Highways advise “Issue passed over to officer for follow-up and investigation”.
1 May 2018: LLRA requested via Highways that officer contact LLRA to update on progress.
7 June 2018: LLRA requested via Highways that officer contact LLRA to update on progress of ref 101000276525.
27 June 2018: Update from Highways “Site meeting with officer and contractor has occurred. Work programmed for completion within next 3 months (from 15 June 2018) (Lloyd)”. On this basis LLRA expect that work would be complete by 15 September 2018.
3 September 2018: Update from Highways “All necessary work has now been carried out and no further action is planned.”
ISSUE CLOSED
I note there was no follow up from November but this and the next batch of snow was when it was in dire need. Just reporting is only stage one. I don’t know who the Customer Services Team are or who is owning the problem your side but it does need follow up. Does this mean you are no longer able to report directly to Footpaths and a named person as in the past? There are regular problems with Higson and they have always been fixed quickly given the community need and access so this is very disappointing
Higson Steps
Litter: Can you please ensure that the litter pickers have a round that includes this path. It is strewn and also with broken glass. Please let me know the answer
Reported 3 April to City of Lincoln Council littering team 01522 873423. Will be forwarded to Community Contracts team for action.
4 April spoke to Dan Taylor the City of Lincoln Litter Enforcement Officer about this and Albion Crescent/Yarborough Road footpath and he will add to his enforcement patrol.
13 April: LLRA announce litter pick to potentially include Higson Steps area: See Help Wanted! Long Leys Spring Tidy Up: Saturday 28 April for info and details on how to volunteer.
28 April: LLRA litter pick covered Higson Steps along with Long Leys Road, Whitton Park and the local footpaths. Our thanks go to all residents who helped with this.
ISSUE CLOSED
Thank you, can you let us know what /when our round will be so that we can check. There is no point in the neighbourhood activity the day before for example
Higson Steps
Allotment refurb: The fencing at the top of the steps is already falling over. If the old shed is still being used for rough sleepers they may have been hanging on to it to avoid falling into the new ditch. Please let me kno when this has ben reported.
Reported 3 April via City of Lincoln Council 01522 873423. Bruce Kelsey, Allotment Strategy Officer at City of Lincoln Council, will visit the site 4 April to assess.
15 April 2018: The fence, enclosing the Burton Ridge allotments has been repaired.
Bruce Kelsey advised that the work at the Ermine ward allotments is part of a city wide project to improve the allotment experience, using money generated from the sale of the unused Riseholme allotment site. Improvements will also include reinstating blocked drains and addressing drainage issues at the Carholme ward Long Leys Road allotments, to stop water coming off the road and flooding the site. This should reduce boggyness in the long term. Some work was done in the winter but with the arrival of the nesting season work will start again in October 2018. Bruce will send through some slides explaining the wider context of this project.
ISSUE CLOSED.
It has been fixed and they are doing more work on it – thank you
Higson Steps
Fencing: The fence (David Wilson Homes) has not yet been reported and is now in danger of taking other panels with it, the salt bin can no longer support it like it did as, of course, it is now empty
Reported 3 April 2018 to Barratt/David Wilson Homes North Midlands Customer Care Team tel: 0115 900 7575
Email: northmidlands@newhomecare.co.uk
Photos of the damaged fence were provided to David Wilson to allow assessment. (Reference is Manrico Drive – Jon Davies)
4 April 2018: David Wilson North Midlands team advise: “As discussed, I have sent this over to our Land Department for confirmation of the land in question, as to who is responsible for this. Once we have confirmation, we will be able to instruct our contractors to rectify this as soon as possible.”
13 April 2018: David Wilson North Midlands team advise 11 April: “Acknowledge responsibility for repair. With fencing contractor (Roberts & Lyons) for quotation. Will advise when date confirmed.”
23 April 2018: David Wilson North Midlands team advise:”our operations manager is attending to inspect this week. Will update when he has visited the site.”
1 May 2018: David Wilson North Midlands team advise:”our operations manager has been on site and identified two posts need replacing. The work is now out for quotation with Roberts & Lyons fencing contractor. The quote should hopefully be with us by the end of the week and the work scheduled soon after that. The reason for the delay is that the contractor originally quoted for replacing the whole fence which the operations manager deemed unnecessary.”
8 May 2018: David Wilson North Midlands team advise:”Still awaiting quote (Jasmine).”
17 May 2018: David Wilson North Midlands team advise:”Received quote 11 May. Now waiting for approval by our Head of Customer Care. Expect them to approve by early next week unless there are further queries. (Kerry).”
25 May 2018: David Wilson North Midlands team advise:”10:47am – Can’t locate the information on Mercer Drive, Lincoln. Let me have your contact details and I will come back to you (Kerry)”.
25 May 2018: David Wilson North Midlands team advise:”11:17am – the repair has been authorised by Barratt & David Wilson Homes Head of Customer Care. I can confirm I have spoken to the fencing contractors and they are looking to do this within the next couple of week (Kerry)”.
12 June 2018: David Wilson North Midlands team advise:”Repair will be complete by latest Friday 22 June (Sophie)”.
18 June 2018: Repair complete.
ISSUE CLOSED.
This is what they said last time when I reported it just before the new committee was set up so they have had months!!!!!
Overgrown shrubs over footpaths: Please could you contact whoever is responsible for the hospital grounds and ask them to cut back their borders especially those that edge the pavements. The rain makes this a real hazard as with head down you just walk into them all. It would also be useful to put this out as a general thing as there are heaps of overgrown shrubs encroaching on to the pavements. If you’re carrying on a conversation and don’t notice, again, you just walk smack into them.
Will remind the hospital of their general responsibility to keep shrubs from overgrowing pavements.
14 April Have done a limited walk around earlier in week and cant find anything amiss but must have missed some area I don’t usually walk. Queried with resident via email.
14 April Feedback from resident “If you come up Carram on the right hand pavement there is a dogwood with red stems.”
15 April Visited area again and photographed the problem shrub to forward to hospital maintenance.
20 April Feedback 18 April from hospital: the shrub has been cut back today.
ISSUE CLOSED.
Still not done. They must have a regular groundsman for the grass etc so they need to be made aware that they need to look over the fences and the walls too.
Common pathway: since the snow when the path wasn’t visible, grass was trampled, horse pooh was hidden and now with all the rain the path is in a terrible state – and has been for weeks if not months now – with two long stretches just covered in mud. This is a well used path and while younger feet can sometimes jump it all, kids, dogs, older people and, most especially prams, cannot avoid it. Could the council please give it a once over to start fresh.
This was reported to City of Lincoln Council and Commons Advisory Panel on 22 March 2018. We are promised action now that the horses have been removed for a fallow period (return mid May). Steve Bird, Assistant Director for Communities and Street Scene has confirmed this will be addressed.
Update 7 April. The path is now clear of mud and pleasant to walk upon again. Looks like the city council have done their stuff.
ISSUE CLOSED.
Thanks, haven’t been that way for a couple of weeks but the mums and prams will especially be pleased!
Graffiti was sprayed around 3 points on Long Leys including the bus shelter some time between Saturday evening (2 June 2018) and Sunday morning (3 June 2018). Thanks to the Stagecoach driver who reported the bus shelter damage, with photo.
The three locations:
* Long Leys Road Bus Shelter
* Green communications box on Albion Crescent junction with Long Leys Road
* Green communications box next to 2 Mitchell Drive
If anyone has any information relating to the culprits please provide it to the Neighbourhood Policing Team. Email: lincolncarholme.npt@lincs.pnn.police.uk
6 June: Reported to the City of Lincoln Council (Via Councillor Preston).
7 June: Reported to Neighbourhood Policing Team (acknowledgement received from PCSO Pete Davies)
8 June: West End residents reported same graffiti at 3 locations in West End including Queens Crescent
10 June: Resident reported that two boxes further along Long Leys Road towards St George’s estate had also been sprayed. Our thanks go to Gemma Carr who got it off with a lot of elbow grease and wd40.
We appear to have a trail of graffiti from West-End/Queens Crescent via West Common to Mitchell Drive to Long Leys Road upto St George’s.
13 June: Councillor Preston contacted LLRA to check if graffiti team had cleaned up the bus stop and other locations. Told her they had not. Councillor Preston said she would escalate this within customer services.
14 June: Councillor Preston updated LLRA with email feedback from Community Contracts Officer – “Thank-you for your email regarding this matter, as you may be aware we have a very limited budget for the removal of graffiti across the City, and as such have a cleansing routine clearing graffiti from the green NTL / BT boxes, which is established by a spreadsheet where they are added to as and when they are reported. This is then passed to Biffa for the relevant boxes to be cleared / painted over. From your report of the graffiti last week, the boxes were added and subsequently sent over to Biffa at the beginning of this week. I will speak to Biffa and ask whether these can be attended to at the beginning of this cleansing routine, however, as I am sure you can appreciate there are many boxes all over the City with the same issues. In regards to the bus shelter, this was also passed to Biffa to clear, and I will request that both this and the boxes are cleared by the end of next week.
Hope this helps.
Kind Regards, Community Contracts Officer”
15 June: Biffa team busy repainting green boxes (had done Mitchell Drive one and working on Albion Crescent location). Bus shelter window not on list for today.
28 June: Graffiti has been removed from bus shelter. All reported graffiti now removed.
ISSUE CLOSED.
Great thanks Jon!
23 June 2018: A lit bollard on Long Leys Road, by the allotments and opposite St George’s hospital by the wooden
bus shelter has been knocked over and needs repair/replacement. The bollard next to it is labelled
11701.
Reported to Lincolnshire County Council Highways via Online Highways Fault Reporting: lincolnshire.gov.uk/faultreporting
30 June 2018: Bollard replaced.
ISSUE CLOSED.
Graffiti has been sprayed on a green communications box on Albion Crescent Lincoln, close to 3 Albion Crescent and opposite 136 Long Leys Road LN1 1EA. Seems to have been done some time ago and then for some reason taped over with a black plastic bag.
Reported to customer.services@lincoln.gov.uk on 18 July 2018 with request for action by graffiti team.
Response code: [cid:691082107@27052009-2A11]
16 August 2018: Rang Lincoln Customer Services to check progress. Advised it had been passed to Laura Armstrong Community Contracts Officer for action. LA not in office but will call with an update [Jack in Customer Services].
16 August 2018: LA rang back and advised that contractor should be re-painting this box by Monday 20 August.
23 August 2018: Box confirmed as repainted
ISSUE CLOSED
Graffiti has been sprayed on the back of a noticeboard on Long Leys Road at the entrance to West Common, opposite Travis Perkins. See attached photo for details. Similar graffiti also sprayed on horse trough on West Common by same entrance on Long Leys Road. See attached photo for details. Nearest postcode to these locations would probably be LN1 1DX or LN1 1DU.
Reported to customer.services@lincoln.gov.uk on 31 December 2018 with request for action by graffiti team.
10 March 2019: highlighted to CAP Democratic Service Officer who passed it on to Open Spaces Officer
12 March 2019: Lee George, Open Spaces Officer, confirmed contractor had been requested to address graffiti
16 March 2019: Graffiti now removed from locations
ISSUE CLOSED
The gate post for the gate from Mitchell Drive into West Common has dropped, so the gate now rests on the ground. See attached photo.
10 March 2019: highlighted to CAP Democratic Service Officer who passed it on to Open Spaces Officer
12 March 2019: Lee George, Open Spaces Officer, confirmed it will be addressed
18 May 2019: New inner and outer gates have been installed.
ISSUE CLOSED
3 April 2019: highlighted to customer.services@lincoln.gov.uk together with Open spaces officer
Discarded tent and contents just by the Long Leys Road main entrance (about 50 metres to the NW of the gate). See photo. There appear some pretty unhygienic rags nearby, so it would need a proper clean up quite quickly.
14 April 2019: Discarded tent has been removed.
ISSUE CLOSED
Reported 8 April 2019 to Barratt/David Wilson Homes North Midlands Customer Care Team tel: 0115 900 7575
Email: northmidlands@newhomecare.co.uk
I write on behalf of Long Leys Residents’ Association, to advise that a section of external fencing to an estate, the responsibility of Barratt/David Wilson, has fallen over. Location is at the St George’s estate, Lincoln opposite 49 Manrico Drive LN1 1AD. The approx north/south running fence is to the east of the estate.
Nature of damage: At least two fence posts have failed and brought down a section of fencing. Photos of the damaged fence attached along with location map. (Reference is Manrico Drive – Jon Davies)
Please instruct your fencing contractor, Roberts & Lyons, to repair this fencing.
I would appreciate confirmation of this fencing failure report and an estimate for likely timescale for repair.
29 April 2019: David Wilson team advise:”Further to your email below I have asked Roberts and Lyons to attend to inspect the damaged fencing, and to then send us a report and a quote to rectify the damage. As soon as we have this back our head of customer care has to approve this and we can then raise and order to get these works completed. We will do our best to keep you updated throughout the process, so at this point we are waiting for confirmation as to what needs to be done and a price for these works.”
Sept 2019 ISSUE CLOSED
Higson Steps. 20 Jan 2020 a resident reported. “I just wondered if anybody had reported the two handrails that were down/removed from 2/3rds up the pathway/steps from the top of Berilldon Drive to Higson Road steps? I did report it on the council website – then after two weeks they replied that it wasn’t their responsibility and that it had to reported to the people responsible for the handrails….. but they failed to tell me who it was (so that was helpful wasn’t it?!)“.
LLRA Response: You did the right thing in terms of contacts. However as explained below, LLRA will ask the Carholme County Councillor to intervene on this occasion. To confirm the usual contact details for the county council are:
* Customer Services Team Tel: 01522 782060
* Email: customer_services@lincolnshire.gov.uk
* Online reporting (by category): https://www.lincolnshire.gov.uk/faultreporting
* Online reporting (for most issues including highways): https://fixmystreet.lincolnshire.gov.uk/
The problem is that there has not been total clarity on the maintenance status of the Higson Steps (see comments from 3 April 2018). The steps now run over city council owned land but historically LCC highways have undertaken the lighting and handrail maintenance…..but ….the path is not shown as a public Right of Way (RoW) on the Definitive Map maintained by the county council. We suspect that someone in Highways has looked at your report and then at the Definitive Map and decided they are not responsible for this route. We have flagged this up to our local County Councillor, Robert Parker and have asked him to intervene, as otherwise we will be stuck in this loop for a while. No further action is required by yourself.
LLRA, as part of the 2021-2040 Neighbourhood Plan activity, is planning to ask for what is called a Definitive Map Modification Order (DMMO) to recognise the Higson Steps as a public RoW. This may stop the same problem happening again in the future. The bad news is that DMMO’s typically take 2 or 3 years to be made.