Back To Jail (oops... School) Soon!

Within the last year one of the primary schools near where I live (not the one my boys go to) had a large, spike-topped, metal fence built around it. This was to prevent the ongoing vandalism that was a problem - there never seemed to be a week went by without some of the windows being smashed. The downside is it also gave the school an appearance of a jail with the little inmates getting their daily exercise in between being locked up inside!

During this summer the school my youngest goes to (the oldest is heading for High School :blink:) has also had one of these fences built round the rear of the school - as in the play ground! Again this is due to the same ongoing problems for the school mentioned above and I have no doubt, in the long run, it is a cheaper alternative to continually replacing the windows... and that like the other school the fence will eventually surround the entire school - and nursery for that matter!

A week or so ago I travelled by bus to Bathgate - a trip that takes you round almost every area of Livingston and something I don't do very often. As the bus passes each of the primary schools in those areas a trend starts to form... yes, you've guessed it, large, spike-topped, metal fences around them! I now don't know of any primary school in this town that doesn't have these fences. To me, its unbelievable that it has come to this... but also inevitable! How long before other buildings get this treatment? The secured housing near me has long been a target of the vandals - and is now partly empty due to this problem! The people that live there have had to be moved and rehoused and possibly separated from whatever friends they had... but then would they want to live there, not knowing when the next window would get smashed - or would they rather move before their homes were turned into prisons, surrounded by those same large, spike-topped, metal fences?

The problem of vandalism is not confined to Livingston... I wonder how long before other areas choose the same method of stopping this problem as this town has - or maybe other areas already have and Livi is just the latest in a long list!