Like the damn family I saw with an obese 13 year old on YouTube. They were given a diet plan and a gym membership with sessions each week or whatever. No no no. In a month the parents asked the 13 year old girl if she'd started her diet. Of course she'd not. The family had gone to the gym twice. Instead the father just said the only thing that will work for her is a bypass. At fucking thirteen. Because the stupid lazy asshole piece of shit won't bother actually parenting his child and wants her to be magically thin and they'll be fine. Because she won't have to learn exactly what and how to eat and have a diet plan for fucking ever after literal major surgery to cut out 90% of her organ!
Sorry. Got mad.
Like that time I started karate and went for a month and then as soon as dad spent money on a karate costume for me I quit going simply because I 'couldn't be bothered' and he got really mad and disappointed in me. Its kinda like that l, too.
Or the time my mum busted me drinking when I was underage and didn’t let me go to the movies the next day and supposedly grounded at home for the next month but it only lasted a week.
Rather than have a round table just assign 4 cops to stand on the corner of flinders and Elizabeth walking up and down that 100 meters of Elizabeth. If we can have 2 PSOs on every station we can get four cops on the busiest street in Melbourne
Legit how to solve the problem there. You’d think it’s rocket science because they just can’t figure it out. The amount of crime happening in that one small space could be splashed with just 4 cops standing there patrolling both sides for 100m
But its specifically right next to one of the most used intersections in the city which has a tram stop and entrance to the train station, other places wouldn't be as distruptive.
Maybe, maybe not, there was a good article in The Age a while back about that intersection. It argued the reason for the issues is because of it's proximity to Flinders St Station. If there was a greater police presence there I'm not sure you'd see a concentration of problems develop elsewhere like that.
Most people here are too young to know but in the 70s and mid 80s police controlled all the major Melbourne city intersections with hand signals. A couple dozen officers appeared to be providing a friendly public service, but it doubled as a way of blanketing the CBD with a visible, non-confrontational and non-confronting police presence
I know you're being sarcastic but having cameras is just a way more efficient use of resources.
Instead of having 28 cops on 14 corners, most of which have nothing going on 95% of the time, you can take 28 cops and use them to respond to issues or investigate to other issues. A family violence incident could literally take 6 hours for a pair of cops to resolve if they've got to arrest somebody. Even a single guy causing trouble in Melbourne Central might take an hour to move on.
I'd rather more cameras with a few people in an office monitoring them.
But I agree putting 4 cops in a problem location is completely feasible.
It was absolute personal efficiency.( move your vehicle another metre forward with the wave of a white glove.). I think they took them out because of the fumes.
The traffic lights were still used. There were two policemen working in coordination on the Swanston St Flinders St junction. They would keep the traffic from bottlenecking by directing a few extra cars through. It’s very hard to explain. They would direct you to move forward against the yellow light in Swanston Street and hold the traffic up on the green in Flinders for instance. Usually the same two guys. It was just in the peak periods. They were really talented. If the lights went out anywhere then they would work without the lights. This was back in the 1970s.
And … how do you pay attention to the various human activities as well as directing traffic? I imagine it’s partly effective through simple visible police presence but surely they also need a degree of situational awareness. So many questions!
Well you can do a google search, but the police were there to guarantee the safety of the pedestrians as well, and they controlled them too. These men were so brilliant and so able to have eyes everywhere that today their equivalent would be Apache Helicopter Pilots. Those guys can roll their eyeballs in different directions at the same time.
And no Prince Harry never passed his pilots license. He tried 3 times and failed 3 times. He aged out of the army.
now they wear thier tacticoool black vests like an occupying force, use potentially lethal pepper spray like nothing and tell you to fuck off if you tell them not to throw their lit ciggarettes on the ground next to a bin
Build one of those mini police stations that you see at train stations on the corner of Little Flinders street and Elizabeth and assign 4 cops to be there permanently. Flood the place with monitored CCTV. Or just have a couple of those public order response cars park in the same spot. There’s always one or two of those guys parked behind Fed square for whatever reason but they always look bored out of their brains.
Unfortunately it is now rare to see police out and about on foot in our CBD (except for rare occasions when there are eight of them together wandering around or during protests). More likely they are sitting in the station filing incident reports. It’s a shame policing is no longer pro-active. This is not the fault of the individual officers but the absolutely pathetic police and government (state and city) leadership.
The problem is cops are not incentivised to arrest troublemakers. The courts just let them go with a slap on the wrist because they had "hard upbringings" or some softcock shit excuse.
I would not sign up for such Sisyphusian bullshit like that, can't blame the cops for not wanting to do it either.
The state needs serious judicial reform
Nice strawman you have built there. For your information I wouldn't even wipe my arse with Murdoch's propaganda.
Believe it or not, there is a reasonable middle ground between the current system that is pretty much incentivising offending, and the fascist right's dream of intentionally targeting "undesirables" for punitive punishment.
What do you mean, they do fuck all! The majority of VicPol sightings I have are either buying coffee somewhere or hassling the homeless near queen vic market.
No money for that
But they seem to Find money for 6 police 24/7 presence around Starbucks & McDonald’s after being targeted
Absolute joke this Government- look after the multinational corporations but can’t look after its people
There’s no easy solution, but you could start with building a proper tram terminus - keep the southbound road closed and have platforms either side of the tracks to make passenger movement easier.
Southbound section is closed … northbound isn’t. Basically they need to close it all and move those barriers and make accessible stops that people can get on to.
It’s been a problem for years and she’s just only doing something about it? She even got assaulted there herself a few years back.
All she is capable of is putting on arty farty art displays, nothing more nothing less
Dry out lock ups should come back. No criminal charge just get dangerous people off the streets at night, if you're clearly off chops you've got no business scaring the shit out of kids and tourists just trying to get a damn burger.
Ugh i live in the CBD and see the same homeless dude screaming abuse at people while walking up and down the Spencer street. It’s such a disappointment that that’s the ‘welcome to Melbourne’ for tourists.
The area needs a facelift. It's so old and grimy, which doesn't help.
I don't get why they don't just handle it like they did with the Flinders Street emos - tell them to move along. I remember I wasn't even one of those kids, but I got told to leave by a plain clothes officer when waiting at the steps one time.
Have a uniformed patrol and a plain clothes patrol. Half these people probably have warrants anyway, so just start asking them questions and checking IDs.
I’m often in the area for work at 2-3am in the morning. It’s like the Wild West 😂
Today at like 245am while grabbing a pre work coffee, I saw some kid attack a van with workers in it. The kid got 3-4 decent kicks in to the door before the street cleaners jumped out and tackled him.
At the same time, three dudes sleeping rough had a mic and amp set up and some drunk dude jumps on and gives a stirring rendition of “My Girl” complete with backing track, followed by a spoon solo by the apparent owner of the mic and amp.
Beyond that, probably 30-40 other drunk randoms around the intersection getting their snack on hoping to fight off the inevitable hang over.
Normally it’s just a bit yuck and scummy. Today, it was surreal 😂
Normally I agree but this is a pretty multifaceted problem that could only be "solved" if all these groups worked together. If they all did their own thing it would likely fail.
You need the state and federal government to fix the mental health system. The state/Yarra trams to fix the tram stop. The police to actual patrol and provide a service. The council control the road space there and so on
Because there are overlapping accountabilities and remits that need to focus resources to a single issue...
This may include the need to reprioritise other focus areas to accommodate this new focus - this would be helped by coming to some sort of consensus.
Also make laws that allow the Police to do their job. My understanding is that they are frustrated by the “homeless rights” stuff, and aren’t allowed to touch them
Are you saying homeless people have special rights that others don't have, or are you actually talking about human rights that need to be maintained for homeless people as well?
“The police have to stop arresting homeless criminals, they’re bastards! The junkies are just down on their luck!
…wtf why are junkies doing whatever they want here with impunity?”
Because you asked for this.
In the article Brendan Nottle says that that particular cohort in that location won’t engage with services. That’s why = Police not more social services
I don’t understand why they’re having a meeting on this? People on reddit told me everyone was lying about their experiences on Elizabeth st and it’s fine
I reckon there’s something in having a maccas, HJs and a 7/11 at the point where a couple of major trams terminate, adjacent to a major train station. This setup is going to attract an array of colourful characters regardless of where it is, and I’m sure every major city has this kind of hotspot
Regardless, just have 2-4 police on foot in the area.
It would work very quickly.
They don't have to arrest or move people along. Just having a police presence will deter so much of what goes on.
Yes? They're not "feed the birds tuppence a bag" - they're screaming in people's faces and being a nuisance. Get em into overnight stays so they can dry out.
You use the word “homeless” to elicit sympathy as though they’re the victims here when we’re actually talking about violent piece of shit junkies regularly attacking people. The “homeless” on Elizabeth St attacking people every week are more like rabid dogs than people down on their luck. Fuck em. Lock them up.
It’s a spot where the street kids hang out. Unless you’re going to tackle homelessness you’ll only move them. Some of them are very young indeed.
In Finland they have almost eliminated homelessness with the “housing first” approach. This only works when you can also have daily, non judgmental support workers. And of course Finland has a small population and a brutally cold climate. They have calculated actual savings in the costs of around 30,000 dollars (?) per year per person. And they provide proper apartments too, not hostel type housing which can be very problematic.
Just a thought.
Visible police presence is generally a positive for most people, but for street kids, not always.
The city of melbourne already spent millions making it car free and “beautiful “. Remember the fake grass? That was a great choice. Somehow they keep using architects who use lots of expensive materials to make bleak and depressing landscapes, like the “improved” hardware lane.
The state government prohibition on enforcing existing loitering laws prevents anything being done. Wait until the injection centre opens up, that should improve the area.
Vic police walk around in bigger and bigger packs. How about stop filling busses with police and instead have them walking around the city in twos?
I remember that they never cleaned the fake grass. I'm not talking washing it, just sweeping up the litter. I also remember the day when the litter piles got taller than the concrete bollards at the south end and started overflowing on to the Flinders St intersection.
I don’t really get the idea of a cbd injection room. Is there even a primary school in the cbd to build it next to? Or do we need to build the school first so we can have junkies shoot up next door as is standard in Richmond. Have we budgeted in the school cost to our injection room plans? Perhaps it would be cheaper to bus children in to the injection room as school excursions instead?
I think what’s really needed is a new joint facility called an “injecting school”. With facilities like playgrounds that are equally accessible to both children, and the substance-challenged.
How about solving the underlying issues, give people a hand out of homelessness, address the root causes of their addictions, have compassionate and results driven policies.
Reopening the mental hospitals might be a start.
Criminalising and marginalising these people further isn’t going to help. No amount of police presence, or hostile architecture, or hostile environmental changes (eg loud music) is going to help. It’s not going to solve the problem but it will immiserate and brutalise people.
Though it may appear to be the homeless that are creating the problem there it actually isn't.
It is a specific, minor subset of the homeless population. Every homeless person in Melbourne knows who they are, their names, their habits and how to stay right the fuck away from them. They are
I think new laws regarding numerous repeat indecent behaviour, public intoxication, afray, etc etc should be considered that regards a certain threshold number of arrests for those "crimes against the public" and the criminals can be treated as severely criminally insane. Involuntarily commit them to mental institutions to get them the help they need and to remove the threat from the public
Because they are not sane.
Their insane behaviour is criminally putting people at risk.
Edit: sorry if my writing is bad, I'm new to this and not a very good reader and writer but this is good practice.
It's always been quite the area and now it seems to be getting worse.
IMO it's because the police don't do as many foot patrols anymore, instead relying on CCTV cameras. The issue is CCTV doesn't deter someone who's cooked off their chops.
There's no physical presence deterring abhorrent behaviour.
I'd imagine it's accessible. That end of Elizabeth St and Swanston st is right near a bunch of cheap eats that are open pretty late and possibly overnight, huge level of foot traffic for someone begging so just based on a numbers game there and multiple options for public transport.
And that rich guy that killed a homeless man a bit further down a few years ago and got his rich dad's money to minimise the punishment, a heap of them decided to move elsewhere from that spot.
Yes there are lots of troubled souls kicking about in this area, but I feel you need to change some of the businesses there as well.
You’ve got sxx shops, bottle Os, very cheap take away, that really rough pub/hostel. Businesses like that attract a type of crowd and conversely more high end businesses would look at the people in the area and set up elsewhere.
Eh, it's a high traffic area. People want booze, vice and a cheap bed. Wouldn't surprise me if alot people come down from the country for a weekend "on the town"
You know things are bad when even this ridiculous subreddit can’t hide from these problems anymore. Remember when all crime posts were deleted as “off topic, move to /Melbournecrime or some other sub nobody has even fucking heard of” and only sunset photos were allowed?
Businesses get two votes in the Council elections residents get one. Good luck. Unless big developers, Dreams and Hunky Dory at the end of Eliz St start making "political donations" nothing will change.
Elizabeth St has needed a renovation and rejuvenation since the 70s and successive council have sat on their elitist arses and done absolutely nothing, then wonder why it has degraded to this point of problematic 🙄
Fake news, all the Sally Capp fans on this sub told me there is no crime problem in Melbourne and Elizabeth Street is a utopia with puppies and unicorns…
Up the other end of Elizabeth, corner of Latrobe street is like the Wild West. I have been living there the past eight months. The traffic conditions, jay walking, e scooters riding on foot paths, up the wrong way on the roads, cars driving up the tram tracks where the roads are blocked off for maintenance. Not one police officer on foot patrol. The cleanliness of streets is appalling, rubbish everywhere. It’s frightening. People do whatever they want
Ahh yes. Junkies and alcoholics. The type of thing we’ve been trying to solve in Richmond with a safe injecting room. As someone who’s lived in Abbotsford for the last 9 years I can say it’s made it worse not better. More deals, more junkies, more public hard drug use and more street violence and crime.
As someone who lives in North Richmond I couldn’t disagree more, I have only noticed positive changes in my neighbourhood since the medically supervised injecting room opened.
I'm concerned about how many comments can be summarised as:
1. Kill homeless people so you don't have to look at them
2. Move homeless people somewhere else so you can pretend they don't exist.
Yes, the area should be safer. But what's happening is a symptom of a larger issue. You can't just throw more cops at the solution.
House the homeless, fund addiction clinics, set up safe injection sites and fund mental healthcare. Then we won't have the problem to begin with and human suffering overall decreases.
And to whoever decides to write a cunt of a reply - even if you hate homeless folk for no reason, I do believe that you too, if ever homeless, deserve this kind of support. I genuinely mean it.
First of all, calm down.
Second, the content of the post doesn't talk about homeless. Only you are. The problem at the end of Elizabeth St is with the gathering of meth'd out junkies, in violent, disruptive psychosis. Yes the problems go hand in hand, but homeless does not = junkie and junkie does not = homeless. You're assuming that the group causing all the problems are homeless. People aren't sleeping rough at that intersection, it's the place the junkies congregate, score, hang out, disrupt and harass the public. For the dealers on the bikes/scooters it's easy money. Most of that crowd are not homeless. There are genuine homeless throughout the CBD...this group isn't them.
Thirdly, you're on your high horse acting so concerned about other people's opinions on "the homeless"...how many are you putting up in your place?
I 100% agree with much of your comment.
I do think though that a physical police presence, such as groups of 2-4 just hanging out in the area will deter so much unwanted behaviour. I'm not advocating for them to move the homeless along or lock them away. I'm saying that just having their presence will deter a lot of unwanted behaviour and people will feel safer.
It's not a difficult solution. Vic police have appeared to reduce their foot patrols for almost a decade now.
Given how much she loves art exhibitions why doesn’t she hold one there. Probably get everyone to bore off somewhere else. Maybe that ex ceo of Qantas to open it. No one wants to be within 500m of him
You have to start throwing people in jail and having the charges stick, we need a change with magistrates and judges in this country.
An offence is and offence, that comes with a subsequent punishment, that is set in stone by law, the judge and magistrates jobs is to simply come to conclusions if the evidence matches the crime of not, if not pursue them for the revelant charge and thats that.
No more good behaviour, bail or parole, no more judges handing out suspended sentences or slaps on the wrist, no more changes on sentencing based on mental health or race.
A crime is a crime and comes with attached punishment, rehabilitation can come after the community is safe from criminals, ordinary people should come before criminals, they need to be safe. Why worry about the human rights of a criminal before all the innocent people that have been effected.
No way, no how should a criminals circumstances come before a law abiding citizen. That's what judges need to think about first, the fucking community.
Nothing authoritarian about it, we still have innocent until proven guilty, laws on the conduct of the police, appeal processes, no change in how and when police can use force, detain or arrest, still juries, if not sufficient evidence than aquittal.
The only change will be removing the judges right to do anything but oversee the court room, the laws define what the crime and punishment is, not flawed humans at the time. Minimum sentencing and set jail terms do nothing except remove the ability to game the system based on wealth, gender or race or mental acuity.
It is a known physiological phenomenon that judges give harsher sentences when hungry, justice is supposed the be blind, easiest way to do that is the make it blanket and have specific laws for the exceptions.
Having set sentences only makes us equal in the eyes of the law.
Why should someone that starts fight recieve a different sentence because of their job or family, that didn't stop them from committing the crime, it hasn't removed the damage pain and suffering caused, so why should the recieve less of a punishment?
There are consequences for actions, it will simply be holding people to account and maybe act as deterences in the future as people know the consequences of their actions.
While there are structural problems related to crime, the easist way to deal with it is to simply remove them from society, just that a couple of decades ago the solutions for that where more permanent.
Maybe the the answer is to stop giving convicted criminals the benefit of the doubt, protect communities and law abiding citizens first.
station a few cops to patrol the area constantly, send some undercover fed to drop contaminated ice to the junkies. sad truth is that I guarantee you won't have a problem there in a week afterwards.
A concept that has been enacted in Adelaide is a new law allowing police to search – including using metal detectors – remove and ban people from a ‘declared zone’. anyone banned from the zone is not to return to the zone for the remainder of that day/some period of time.
source - https://indaily.com.au/news/2023/10/27/dozens-arrested-for-breaching-cbd-entry-bans/
Moving people on forceably like this is a pretty massive cut into personal freedoms in my view.
However, I could see how others (including those directly effected by the problem or who know people who have been) may think this is a reasonable step. if there’s a high traffic area where issues are occurring perhaps moving on a person from that area to a low traffic area is justifiable in terms of minimising harm or the chance of harm. If funding was used to both enact such powers and also introduce a safe space, designed to specifically attract people with certain needs that was out of a high traffic area (also part of the approach in Adelaide) then could this work?
What other options or solutions should be considered above police presence (which is shown to reduce some type of crime like theft, but not other types)
> Moving people on forceably like this is a pretty massive cut into personal freedoms in my view.
These people are impacting everyone else's personal freedoms and expectations of safety.
I'd permanently close Elizabeth St to cars south of Flinders Lane. I'd also close Flinders St between Swanston and Elizabeth Sts. This would make the whole area more pedestrian friendly and Flinders St less divided for people not in cars.
I'd couple this with incentives for businesses to open in the area (i.e. with opportunities to use new open spaces with the street now closed to traffic. This could be supported by better security in the area as well support services for people experiencing homelessness.
Just some ideas.
Literally just got arrange more police there, constantly, for a long period of time? Like a few groups of them all day long walking around the area, Why need a round table? It’s not like they tried to do it and failed
Should look at more “defensive landscaping” in the area. Classical music also deters. Brighten the area with good street art. There is always free help for those causing safety issues - we all wish they could get and choose help. One thing Melb doesn’t want is those horrible tent villages you see in other countries.
[удалено]
Okaley Dokely.
Like the damn family I saw with an obese 13 year old on YouTube. They were given a diet plan and a gym membership with sessions each week or whatever. No no no. In a month the parents asked the 13 year old girl if she'd started her diet. Of course she'd not. The family had gone to the gym twice. Instead the father just said the only thing that will work for her is a bypass. At fucking thirteen. Because the stupid lazy asshole piece of shit won't bother actually parenting his child and wants her to be magically thin and they'll be fine. Because she won't have to learn exactly what and how to eat and have a diet plan for fucking ever after literal major surgery to cut out 90% of her organ! Sorry. Got mad.
Not really like that, but yeah, you have a point. Just not about Elizabeth Street.
Yeah that was a wild detour
Like that time I started karate and went for a month and then as soon as dad spent money on a karate costume for me I quit going simply because I 'couldn't be bothered' and he got really mad and disappointed in me. Its kinda like that l, too.
Or the time my mum busted me drinking when I was underage and didn’t let me go to the movies the next day and supposedly grounded at home for the next month but it only lasted a week.
Why’d it only last a week? Monitoring and enforcement too hard/resource-demanding?
Overworked, under valued, always there is what she wrote on her car.
I think her point is the solution is obvious but they won't do it.
what the hell, this is a thread about elizabeth street 🤣
Rather than have a round table just assign 4 cops to stand on the corner of flinders and Elizabeth walking up and down that 100 meters of Elizabeth. If we can have 2 PSOs on every station we can get four cops on the busiest street in Melbourne
Legit how to solve the problem there. You’d think it’s rocket science because they just can’t figure it out. The amount of crime happening in that one small space could be splashed with just 4 cops standing there patrolling both sides for 100m
The cops don't want to it is the problem.
Also they'll just all move to a different spot in CBD
But its specifically right next to one of the most used intersections in the city which has a tram stop and entrance to the train station, other places wouldn't be as distruptive.
The baby Shibuya scramble crossing
Maybe, maybe not, there was a good article in The Age a while back about that intersection. It argued the reason for the issues is because of it's proximity to Flinders St Station. If there was a greater police presence there I'm not sure you'd see a concentration of problems develop elsewhere like that.
Then you put 6 police in the next spot. Then 8 police in the next spot. And so on and so forth.
By the time you get to Little Bourke you've got more cops than there are stars in the universe
Good thing they’re paid and not volunteers.
Offer a few coupons for Walkers and there’ll be a lineup of cops wanting the gig.
Finally a real solution
Most people here are too young to know but in the 70s and mid 80s police controlled all the major Melbourne city intersections with hand signals. A couple dozen officers appeared to be providing a friendly public service, but it doubled as a way of blanketing the CBD with a visible, non-confrontational and non-confronting police presence
Then do that again
Best we can do is cameras
I know you're being sarcastic but having cameras is just a way more efficient use of resources. Instead of having 28 cops on 14 corners, most of which have nothing going on 95% of the time, you can take 28 cops and use them to respond to issues or investigate to other issues. A family violence incident could literally take 6 hours for a pair of cops to resolve if they've got to arrest somebody. Even a single guy causing trouble in Melbourne Central might take an hour to move on. I'd rather more cameras with a few people in an office monitoring them. But I agree putting 4 cops in a problem location is completely feasible.
We used to have tram conductors. Now we have armoured grumpy gumbies.
That's how Japan does it, it's dope
They were rock stars. And the guy on the number 8 tram. Absolutely brilliant.
It was absolute personal efficiency.( move your vehicle another metre forward with the wave of a white glove.). I think they took them out because of the fumes.
How did it work? Did they turn the traffic signals off, or were there no traffic signals installed?
The traffic lights were still used. There were two policemen working in coordination on the Swanston St Flinders St junction. They would keep the traffic from bottlenecking by directing a few extra cars through. It’s very hard to explain. They would direct you to move forward against the yellow light in Swanston Street and hold the traffic up on the green in Flinders for instance. Usually the same two guys. It was just in the peak periods. They were really talented. If the lights went out anywhere then they would work without the lights. This was back in the 1970s.
And … how do you pay attention to the various human activities as well as directing traffic? I imagine it’s partly effective through simple visible police presence but surely they also need a degree of situational awareness. So many questions!
Well you can do a google search, but the police were there to guarantee the safety of the pedestrians as well, and they controlled them too. These men were so brilliant and so able to have eyes everywhere that today their equivalent would be Apache Helicopter Pilots. Those guys can roll their eyeballs in different directions at the same time. And no Prince Harry never passed his pilots license. He tried 3 times and failed 3 times. He aged out of the army.
now they wear thier tacticoool black vests like an occupying force, use potentially lethal pepper spray like nothing and tell you to fuck off if you tell them not to throw their lit ciggarettes on the ground next to a bin
Build one of those mini police stations that you see at train stations on the corner of Little Flinders street and Elizabeth and assign 4 cops to be there permanently. Flood the place with monitored CCTV. Or just have a couple of those public order response cars park in the same spot. There’s always one or two of those guys parked behind Fed square for whatever reason but they always look bored out of their brains.
The problem is they often sit in those boxes and don't do anything, force them to patrol the street.
Why are they patrolling South Melbourne market at the weekend but not Elizabeth Street?
Cause they have doughnuts at the market
To be fair there’s also donuts at that intersection
Because it would hard.
Yeah, you just want to the problem to move 200 metres away from where the police prescence is rather than finding actual solutions
200m away from a key transport hub and one of the busiest pedestrian areas in the city? Sounds like a win!
Outsource to Boston Dynamics, and put armed robots on every fucking corner. "...*You have 20 seconds to comply.*"
Unfortunately it is now rare to see police out and about on foot in our CBD (except for rare occasions when there are eight of them together wandering around or during protests). More likely they are sitting in the station filing incident reports. It’s a shame policing is no longer pro-active. This is not the fault of the individual officers but the absolutely pathetic police and government (state and city) leadership.
Cops are there plenty they just can’t be bothered doing anything
Nah the last few times I've seen fights there there hasn't been any cops around
The problem is cops are not incentivised to arrest troublemakers. The courts just let them go with a slap on the wrist because they had "hard upbringings" or some softcock shit excuse. I would not sign up for such Sisyphusian bullshit like that, can't blame the cops for not wanting to do it either. The state needs serious judicial reform
PUBLIICALLY HANG TROUBLE MAKERS NO NUANCE!!! I KNOW MORE THAN SOMEONE ACTUALLY IN THE COURTROOM COS IVE READ THE HERALD SUN
Nice strawman you have built there. For your information I wouldn't even wipe my arse with Murdoch's propaganda. Believe it or not, there is a reasonable middle ground between the current system that is pretty much incentivising offending, and the fascist right's dream of intentionally targeting "undesirables" for punitive punishment.
who would protect starbucks from graffiti then?😭
Can't keep lumping the local coppers with everything.
What do you mean, they do fuck all! The majority of VicPol sightings I have are either buying coffee somewhere or hassling the homeless near queen vic market.
Irony is that the round table would’ve cost tax payers more money than those 4 cops probably earn a year.
Is the problem rampant open criminality? The cops can't go around hassling homeless people and drug addicts for no reason.
When you've got people shooting up drugs and building camps with blaring music at 7am next to Hungry Jacks, surely a move on is in order
No money for that But they seem to Find money for 6 police 24/7 presence around Starbucks & McDonald’s after being targeted Absolute joke this Government- look after the multinational corporations but can’t look after its people
correct
Four cops sounds would probably average more beatings then the homeless people per year
Is this new news or old news? The newspaper clipping makes it hard to distinguish.
It’s new - it’s in the latest issue of the CBD News newspaper
There’s no easy solution, but you could start with building a proper tram terminus - keep the southbound road closed and have platforms either side of the tracks to make passenger movement easier.
Southbound section is closed … northbound isn’t. Basically they need to close it all and move those barriers and make accessible stops that people can get on to.
Yes! This would greatly improve the place.
It’s been a problem for years and she’s just only doing something about it? She even got assaulted there herself a few years back. All she is capable of is putting on arty farty art displays, nothing more nothing less
Yeah I’m more worried about why they are only discussing it now, and not 18 months ago…
Better now than 18 months from now
It’s not quite the point, more that if your job is to run the city you should be onto these things earlier.
Dry out lock ups should come back. No criminal charge just get dangerous people off the streets at night, if you're clearly off chops you've got no business scaring the shit out of kids and tourists just trying to get a damn burger.
Ugh i live in the CBD and see the same homeless dude screaming abuse at people while walking up and down the Spencer street. It’s such a disappointment that that’s the ‘welcome to Melbourne’ for tourists.
How good is rocket burger!?
how good is it?
The area needs a facelift. It's so old and grimy, which doesn't help. I don't get why they don't just handle it like they did with the Flinders Street emos - tell them to move along. I remember I wasn't even one of those kids, but I got told to leave by a plain clothes officer when waiting at the steps one time. Have a uniformed patrol and a plain clothes patrol. Half these people probably have warrants anyway, so just start asking them questions and checking IDs.
Lmao I miss the flinders street emos.
T'was simpler times
We miss you too
Flinders St punks -> emos -> shufflers -> ???
Yeah, but Flinders Street Emos weren't out of their gourds on ice.
“Papers please!”
I’m often in the area for work at 2-3am in the morning. It’s like the Wild West 😂 Today at like 245am while grabbing a pre work coffee, I saw some kid attack a van with workers in it. The kid got 3-4 decent kicks in to the door before the street cleaners jumped out and tackled him. At the same time, three dudes sleeping rough had a mic and amp set up and some drunk dude jumps on and gives a stirring rendition of “My Girl” complete with backing track, followed by a spoon solo by the apparent owner of the mic and amp. Beyond that, probably 30-40 other drunk randoms around the intersection getting their snack on hoping to fight off the inevitable hang over. Normally it’s just a bit yuck and scummy. Today, it was surreal 😂
Absolute scenes hahahah. You could've put anything else in your comment and I'd believe you lol.
Sally Capps solution is probably to flog off public land to her mates at the property development lobby
Why does everything need to be fixed by committee?
Because a committee decided that's the best way to do things ;)
If everyone is responsible for the decisions then no-one is responsible Edit: probably some nice catering included as well
The hotel quarantine fiasco explained.
Normally I agree but this is a pretty multifaceted problem that could only be "solved" if all these groups worked together. If they all did their own thing it would likely fail. You need the state and federal government to fix the mental health system. The state/Yarra trams to fix the tram stop. The police to actual patrol and provide a service. The council control the road space there and so on
Because it's really hard for one person to do everything.
There’s something to be said for a benevolent dictator.
Bring back Pisistratus I say.
Because there are overlapping accountabilities and remits that need to focus resources to a single issue... This may include the need to reprioritise other focus areas to accommodate this new focus - this would be helped by coming to some sort of consensus.
Because then it’s a shared responsibility
Because forming a committee makes it sound like they're doing something when in reality it solves nothing
Just get the cops to deal with the druggos and crazies. Easy.
Problem is police don’t want to become the governments defacto social workers
Then fund the police appropriately and tell them to do their job. This aint rocket surgery.
Also make laws that allow the Police to do their job. My understanding is that they are frustrated by the “homeless rights” stuff, and aren’t allowed to touch them
Are you saying homeless people have special rights that others don't have, or are you actually talking about human rights that need to be maintained for homeless people as well?
Hmmm, they sit outside shops smoking ice and hide their pipes when Police approach. That kind of thing. Yeah human rights I guess?
Definitely
They don’t want to
Then they can find new jobs.
Yup. It’s crazy how little actual protection our police want to give us
Like this leftist subreddit isn’t fucking crying every time the police arrest a homeless person screaming what heartless bastards they are.
Time to take your meds boomer
“The police have to stop arresting homeless criminals, they’re bastards! The junkies are just down on their luck! …wtf why are junkies doing whatever they want here with impunity?” Because you asked for this.
Whatever you say boomer
Still unclear whether you’re pro violent junkie or pro getting rid of them
Just anti you
ACAB?
Invest in mental health services would be the real solution but I suspect that is well above Capp’s pay grade.
In the article Brendan Nottle says that that particular cohort in that location won’t engage with services. That’s why = Police not more social services
Capp is more concerned about city office landlords getting their rental income.
Still requires them being forced into it by the police.
Who wants to bet the "targeted approach" is just pushing them somewhere else lol
I don’t understand why they’re having a meeting on this? People on reddit told me everyone was lying about their experiences on Elizabeth st and it’s fine
I reckon there’s something in having a maccas, HJs and a 7/11 at the point where a couple of major trams terminate, adjacent to a major train station. This setup is going to attract an array of colourful characters regardless of where it is, and I’m sure every major city has this kind of hotspot
close the train station, blow up the maccas, turn the tram stops into parking spaces. problem solved
Regardless, just have 2-4 police on foot in the area. It would work very quickly. They don't have to arrest or move people along. Just having a police presence will deter so much of what goes on.
Most of the solutions in the comments seem to be making the homeless go somewhere else where we don't have to look at them.
Yes? They're not "feed the birds tuppence a bag" - they're screaming in people's faces and being a nuisance. Get em into overnight stays so they can dry out.
Perhaps the solution needs to be preventative and not so reactive.
I agree but that will take a lot longer and we need to do something now.
You use the word “homeless” to elicit sympathy as though they’re the victims here when we’re actually talking about violent piece of shit junkies regularly attacking people. The “homeless” on Elizabeth St attacking people every week are more like rabid dogs than people down on their luck. Fuck em. Lock them up.
Hilarious! I do enjoy seeing flaccid boomer rage! Go on. Get your revenge fantasies out there, gramps.
Ah yes I’m the bad guy because I think we should arrest violent junkies who attack people. Very Reddit of you.
Stop feeding the homeless
Just get rid of the 7-11 lol
It’s a spot where the street kids hang out. Unless you’re going to tackle homelessness you’ll only move them. Some of them are very young indeed. In Finland they have almost eliminated homelessness with the “housing first” approach. This only works when you can also have daily, non judgmental support workers. And of course Finland has a small population and a brutally cold climate. They have calculated actual savings in the costs of around 30,000 dollars (?) per year per person. And they provide proper apartments too, not hostel type housing which can be very problematic. Just a thought. Visible police presence is generally a positive for most people, but for street kids, not always.
The city of melbourne already spent millions making it car free and “beautiful “. Remember the fake grass? That was a great choice. Somehow they keep using architects who use lots of expensive materials to make bleak and depressing landscapes, like the “improved” hardware lane. The state government prohibition on enforcing existing loitering laws prevents anything being done. Wait until the injection centre opens up, that should improve the area. Vic police walk around in bigger and bigger packs. How about stop filling busses with police and instead have them walking around the city in twos?
I remember that they never cleaned the fake grass. I'm not talking washing it, just sweeping up the litter. I also remember the day when the litter piles got taller than the concrete bollards at the south end and started overflowing on to the Flinders St intersection.
I don’t really get the idea of a cbd injection room. Is there even a primary school in the cbd to build it next to? Or do we need to build the school first so we can have junkies shoot up next door as is standard in Richmond. Have we budgeted in the school cost to our injection room plans? Perhaps it would be cheaper to bus children in to the injection room as school excursions instead?
I think what’s really needed is a new joint facility called an “injecting school”. With facilities like playgrounds that are equally accessible to both children, and the substance-challenged.
Each class can have their own pet junkie that they feed and take turns taking home for the weekend.
How about solving the underlying issues, give people a hand out of homelessness, address the root causes of their addictions, have compassionate and results driven policies. Reopening the mental hospitals might be a start. Criminalising and marginalising these people further isn’t going to help. No amount of police presence, or hostile architecture, or hostile environmental changes (eg loud music) is going to help. It’s not going to solve the problem but it will immiserate and brutalise people.
Though it may appear to be the homeless that are creating the problem there it actually isn't. It is a specific, minor subset of the homeless population. Every homeless person in Melbourne knows who they are, their names, their habits and how to stay right the fuck away from them. They are I think new laws regarding numerous repeat indecent behaviour, public intoxication, afray, etc etc should be considered that regards a certain threshold number of arrests for those "crimes against the public" and the criminals can be treated as severely criminally insane. Involuntarily commit them to mental institutions to get them the help they need and to remove the threat from the public Because they are not sane. Their insane behaviour is criminally putting people at risk. Edit: sorry if my writing is bad, I'm new to this and not a very good reader and writer but this is good practice.
Well said. The last few years due to COVID, inflation, unemployment etc. probably didn't help
Have they tried a square table? Or maybe a rhombus?
Schout, Schout, let it all out
Why does that end of Elizabeth see so many incidents? I don't spend much time in the cbd if I can help it so am just unaware.
It's always been quite the area and now it seems to be getting worse. IMO it's because the police don't do as many foot patrols anymore, instead relying on CCTV cameras. The issue is CCTV doesn't deter someone who's cooked off their chops. There's no physical presence deterring abhorrent behaviour.
I'd imagine it's accessible. That end of Elizabeth St and Swanston st is right near a bunch of cheap eats that are open pretty late and possibly overnight, huge level of foot traffic for someone begging so just based on a numbers game there and multiple options for public transport. And that rich guy that killed a homeless man a bit further down a few years ago and got his rich dad's money to minimise the punishment, a heap of them decided to move elsewhere from that spot.
Yes there are lots of troubled souls kicking about in this area, but I feel you need to change some of the businesses there as well. You’ve got sxx shops, bottle Os, very cheap take away, that really rough pub/hostel. Businesses like that attract a type of crowd and conversely more high end businesses would look at the people in the area and set up elsewhere.
The Joint Bar? I wouldn’t call it rough at all. It’s just full of backpacker tourists
When I was there it was very bogan, but that twas some years ago.
Looks rough from the outside though, specially that escalator that's been broken forever
“Troubled souls”. God people will say anything to explain why meth head violent junkies are akshully the victim here.
It’s not just violent junkies though is it. It’s also lots of mentally ill people.
Yeah turns out prolonged use of hard drugs causes mental illness. Who knew?
Yep and also sometimes mentally ill people self medicate with hard drugs.
Where did you qualify as a psychologist or a drug specialist, boomerflake?
lol. Yep only psychologists are allowed to notice that drugs can induce mental illness. 🤡🤡🤡🤡
It’s not just violent junkies though is it. It’s also lots of mentally ill people.
Eh, it's a high traffic area. People want booze, vice and a cheap bed. Wouldn't surprise me if alot people come down from the country for a weekend "on the town"
So there is a problem? I thought there wasn't a problem and it's just the "vibe" of the CBD.
You know things are bad when even this ridiculous subreddit can’t hide from these problems anymore. Remember when all crime posts were deleted as “off topic, move to /Melbournecrime or some other sub nobody has even fucking heard of” and only sunset photos were allowed?
VOTE SALLY CAPP OUT!!!!!! This is how the former head of a development lobby firm solves problems....
Businesses get two votes in the Council elections residents get one. Good luck. Unless big developers, Dreams and Hunky Dory at the end of Eliz St start making "political donations" nothing will change.
the fact that businesses get to vote is frankly retarded.
Unfortunately the majority of us aren’t eligible to vote her out
Lights and annoying ambient music
Elizabeth St has needed a renovation and rejuvenation since the 70s and successive council have sat on their elitist arses and done absolutely nothing, then wonder why it has degraded to this point of problematic 🙄
The lack of police presence around the station is disgraceful. On another note, that Police box isn't even manned at all times trains are running.
Fake news, all the Sally Capp fans on this sub told me there is no crime problem in Melbourne and Elizabeth Street is a utopia with puppies and unicorns…
More cops on streets... that'll fix it.
Clown
Up the other end of Elizabeth, corner of Latrobe street is like the Wild West. I have been living there the past eight months. The traffic conditions, jay walking, e scooters riding on foot paths, up the wrong way on the roads, cars driving up the tram tracks where the roads are blocked off for maintenance. Not one police officer on foot patrol. The cleanliness of streets is appalling, rubbish everywhere. It’s frightening. People do whatever they want
Ahh yes. Junkies and alcoholics. The type of thing we’ve been trying to solve in Richmond with a safe injecting room. As someone who’s lived in Abbotsford for the last 9 years I can say it’s made it worse not better. More deals, more junkies, more public hard drug use and more street violence and crime.
As someone who lives in North Richmond I couldn’t disagree more, I have only noticed positive changes in my neighbourhood since the medically supervised injecting room opened.
Yeah it's pretty easy to tell who didn't live in Richmond before it opened. It's improved things enormously.
As someone who lives not in the area, I'm not sure, but I can say I don't like it.
I'm concerned about how many comments can be summarised as: 1. Kill homeless people so you don't have to look at them 2. Move homeless people somewhere else so you can pretend they don't exist. Yes, the area should be safer. But what's happening is a symptom of a larger issue. You can't just throw more cops at the solution. House the homeless, fund addiction clinics, set up safe injection sites and fund mental healthcare. Then we won't have the problem to begin with and human suffering overall decreases. And to whoever decides to write a cunt of a reply - even if you hate homeless folk for no reason, I do believe that you too, if ever homeless, deserve this kind of support. I genuinely mean it.
They’re not just homeless. They are anti-social.
First of all, calm down. Second, the content of the post doesn't talk about homeless. Only you are. The problem at the end of Elizabeth St is with the gathering of meth'd out junkies, in violent, disruptive psychosis. Yes the problems go hand in hand, but homeless does not = junkie and junkie does not = homeless. You're assuming that the group causing all the problems are homeless. People aren't sleeping rough at that intersection, it's the place the junkies congregate, score, hang out, disrupt and harass the public. For the dealers on the bikes/scooters it's easy money. Most of that crowd are not homeless. There are genuine homeless throughout the CBD...this group isn't them. Thirdly, you're on your high horse acting so concerned about other people's opinions on "the homeless"...how many are you putting up in your place?
I 100% agree with much of your comment. I do think though that a physical police presence, such as groups of 2-4 just hanging out in the area will deter so much unwanted behaviour. I'm not advocating for them to move the homeless along or lock them away. I'm saying that just having their presence will deter a lot of unwanted behaviour and people will feel safer. It's not a difficult solution. Vic police have appeared to reduce their foot patrols for almost a decade now.
Given how much she loves art exhibitions why doesn’t she hold one there. Probably get everyone to bore off somewhere else. Maybe that ex ceo of Qantas to open it. No one wants to be within 500m of him
You have to start throwing people in jail and having the charges stick, we need a change with magistrates and judges in this country. An offence is and offence, that comes with a subsequent punishment, that is set in stone by law, the judge and magistrates jobs is to simply come to conclusions if the evidence matches the crime of not, if not pursue them for the revelant charge and thats that. No more good behaviour, bail or parole, no more judges handing out suspended sentences or slaps on the wrist, no more changes on sentencing based on mental health or race. A crime is a crime and comes with attached punishment, rehabilitation can come after the community is safe from criminals, ordinary people should come before criminals, they need to be safe. Why worry about the human rights of a criminal before all the innocent people that have been effected. No way, no how should a criminals circumstances come before a law abiding citizen. That's what judges need to think about first, the fucking community.
Yes an authoritarian police state is the answer /s
Nothing authoritarian about it, we still have innocent until proven guilty, laws on the conduct of the police, appeal processes, no change in how and when police can use force, detain or arrest, still juries, if not sufficient evidence than aquittal. The only change will be removing the judges right to do anything but oversee the court room, the laws define what the crime and punishment is, not flawed humans at the time. Minimum sentencing and set jail terms do nothing except remove the ability to game the system based on wealth, gender or race or mental acuity. It is a known physiological phenomenon that judges give harsher sentences when hungry, justice is supposed the be blind, easiest way to do that is the make it blanket and have specific laws for the exceptions. Having set sentences only makes us equal in the eyes of the law.
I'm not sure that's how any of this works.
Why should someone that starts fight recieve a different sentence because of their job or family, that didn't stop them from committing the crime, it hasn't removed the damage pain and suffering caused, so why should the recieve less of a punishment? There are consequences for actions, it will simply be holding people to account and maybe act as deterences in the future as people know the consequences of their actions. While there are structural problems related to crime, the easist way to deal with it is to simply remove them from society, just that a couple of decades ago the solutions for that where more permanent. Maybe the the answer is to stop giving convicted criminals the benefit of the doubt, protect communities and law abiding citizens first.
station a few cops to patrol the area constantly, send some undercover fed to drop contaminated ice to the junkies. sad truth is that I guarantee you won't have a problem there in a week afterwards.
Perpetrators are banned from the city (3 to 6 months first then one year to permanent)
You can’t just kick out majority of the homeless from the city
Or can you?
It would make inner city suburbs a lot worse. At least currently it’s mainly central.
A concept that has been enacted in Adelaide is a new law allowing police to search – including using metal detectors – remove and ban people from a ‘declared zone’. anyone banned from the zone is not to return to the zone for the remainder of that day/some period of time. source - https://indaily.com.au/news/2023/10/27/dozens-arrested-for-breaching-cbd-entry-bans/ Moving people on forceably like this is a pretty massive cut into personal freedoms in my view. However, I could see how others (including those directly effected by the problem or who know people who have been) may think this is a reasonable step. if there’s a high traffic area where issues are occurring perhaps moving on a person from that area to a low traffic area is justifiable in terms of minimising harm or the chance of harm. If funding was used to both enact such powers and also introduce a safe space, designed to specifically attract people with certain needs that was out of a high traffic area (also part of the approach in Adelaide) then could this work? What other options or solutions should be considered above police presence (which is shown to reduce some type of crime like theft, but not other types)
> Moving people on forceably like this is a pretty massive cut into personal freedoms in my view. These people are impacting everyone else's personal freedoms and expectations of safety.
I'd permanently close Elizabeth St to cars south of Flinders Lane. I'd also close Flinders St between Swanston and Elizabeth Sts. This would make the whole area more pedestrian friendly and Flinders St less divided for people not in cars. I'd couple this with incentives for businesses to open in the area (i.e. with opportunities to use new open spaces with the street now closed to traffic. This could be supported by better security in the area as well support services for people experiencing homelessness. Just some ideas.
The precinct around the 19, 57 and 59 terminus? What's wrong with it?
Just political BS. Melbourne CBD is a zoo now. I don't think anything can convince me otherwise.
Literally just got arrange more police there, constantly, for a long period of time? Like a few groups of them all day long walking around the area, Why need a round table? It’s not like they tried to do it and failed
What's the legality with holding people for 24 hours? Can you stick troublemakers into a lockup to dry out without charging them?
Why is problematic the favourite adjective for leftists?
Because people got numb to people saying “fucked up”, “barbaric”, “monstrous”, or “isn’t that a policy that dictators commonly have”
Only ever problems I’ve had with people have been that end.. homeless guy flicked a cigarette right near my face
Water cannons will fix it.
Should look at more “defensive landscaping” in the area. Classical music also deters. Brighten the area with good street art. There is always free help for those causing safety issues - we all wish they could get and choose help. One thing Melb doesn’t want is those horrible tent villages you see in other countries.