'Break-ins and illicit behaviour' in Preston alleyways prompt action from council

Preston City Council planners have granted permission for the security features in Ashton-on-Ribble.

Four individual gates will be put in place at the end of alleyways which bound houses fronting parts of Balcarres Road, Blackpool Road, Briggs Road and Shelley Road.

A planning officer report says the council decided the alleyways were in need of gating as a result of a police assessment of “break-ins from the rear of the properties”.

It added that the gates would help reduce “the propensity for illicit activities” in the area. Two residents who wrote in support of the proposal stated that “the seclusion” of the alleyways was attracting antisocial behaviour as well as crime.

Residents and businesses in the immediate vicinity will be given keys for access to the newly shut-off spaces - as will the police, fire brigade, council neighbourhood services and others who need them in order to carry out statutory duties.

The gates themselves will be made of galvanised steel - painted black - and be no taller than 2.5 metres. They will bear the name of the street they face in gold lettering.

Planning officials concluded that the Grade II-listed Tulketh Mill and Chimney would not be adversely affected by the location of the new gates, one of which will be just 37 metres away from the site.

The streets will be added to the more than 120 others in Preston where alleygates have long been fixtures.

Last autumn, the city council undertook a review of the security gates - as it is required to do every three years, under government legislation - and the public overwhelmingly backed retaining them.

However, some of the responses to a public consultation into their retention - including one from a resident in Ashton-on-Ribble - accused the authority of failing to maintain the alleyways by removing weeds and rubbish.

In response, cabinet member for environment and community safety Freddie Bailey pledged to address the issue by raising it with the council’s street cleaning teams and “through ongoing dialogue with the residents”.