Cleanliness Surveys

• Why do we need a Cleanliness Survey?
• How and what is it measured?
• What are the ten land use classes?
• What are the results of previous surveys?
• What do I do if I need to ask any questions?

National indicator NI 195

National Indicator 195 - Improved street and environmental cleanliness (levels of litter, detritus, graffiti and fly posting) measures street cleanliness and local environmental quality.

Background

In October 2006, the Government issued the White Paper ‘Strong and Prosperous Communities’. The White Paper announced a new, simplified performance framework for local authority services. Local authorities are already under a duty to prepare a Sustainable Community Strategy setting out the strategic vision for their area. They are required to prepare a delivery plan for the strategy – known as a Local Area Agreement.

In November 2007 the Government identified a set of 198 national indicators that can be used to measure service outcomes. NI 195 is one of the 198 national indicators that is designed to measure LEQ, and covers litter, detritus, graffiti and flyposting. The survey that forms the basis of the NI 195 Cleanliness Performance Indicator has been developed to measure the cleanliness of the local environment, as a member of the public would see it.

It is based on the methodology of the Local Environmental Quality Survey of England (LEQSE) developed by ENCAMS (Environmental Campaigns), for monitoring a range of local environmental issues. The results will be comparable with the overall national returns delivered to the Government every year.

How and what is it measured?

We are required to assess and grade 900 transects (300 for each 4 months), in 10 different land use classes, across the District per annum. Transects are identified as a 50m section of land. These will be surveyed in:-

• April - July
• August – November
• December - March

Each 50m transect is assessed and graded using the cleanliness grades set out in the Code of Practice on Litter and Refuse (COPL&R), ranging from Grade A (clean) to Grade D (heavily affected). The four elements of NI 195 – litter (NI 195a.), detritus (NI 195b.), graffiti (NI 195c.) and flyposting (NI 195d.) is measured separately.

Where conditions fall in between these four grades, surveyors may use intermediate grades – B+ if standards fall somewhere between Grade A and Grade B; B – if standards fall between Grade B and Grade C; and C – if standards are between Grade C and Grade D.

For each of the four elements – litter detritus, graffiti and flyposting – the NI 195 measure will be based on the percentage of transects surveyed that fall below a Grade B, which is regarded as satisfactory. However, in the case of sites graded B –, these sites will be given half the weight of sites that are graded C, C – or D in calculating the overall Indicators for litter, detritus, graffiti and flyposting.

The NI 195 Indicator uses the percentage of transects falling below a Grade B, rather than those which are Grade B or above, because this is the way that the public appear to perceive cleanliness. They react to transects which they regard as unsatisfactory – and which they may well complain about – rather than when conditions are satisfactory.

NI195 Survey as management tool and targets

We treat the survey results as a fundamental management tool which help us identify areas where, for some reason, standards are not being maintained in a consistent manner followed by corrective and preventative action.

We have set a target for each of the 4 elements as follows:

Litter: 4%

Detritus: 15%

Graffiti: 2.5%

Flyposting: 0.5%

The 10 land use classes

The NI 195 measures the extent of litter and detritus on ten different land use classes of relevant land:

Main Retail and Commercial Areas

This Land Use Class includes the main town and city retail and commercial centres. Urban tourist ‘hot spots’ which are wholly or partially separated from a main town or city retail and commercial centre - for example, Durham Cathedral Close - are also included in this Land Use Class.

Main Retail and Commercial Areas contain a choice of outlets in a range of different retail and commercial sectors (such as fashion clothing, financial services, restaurants, bars and entertainments), and will include national and international brand names. Normally, there is also a range of public facilities, including libraries, museums, law courts, and places of worship.

Other Retail and Commercial Areas

This Land Use Class covers retail and commercial areas located outside main city and town retail and commercial centres (but excludes out-of-town or edge-of-town ‘retail park/retail shed’ developments, which are included with industry, warehousing and science parks). Other Retail and Commercial Areas must contain a minimum, continuous retail / commercial frontage of 50 metres.

Other Retail and Commercial Areas usually contain a range of facilities that mainly meet the needs of local residents. Most premises contain individual private businesses, sometimes branches of regional chains (such as bakers), and occasionally national brand names.

High Obstruction Housing Areas

Housing areas should be classified as ‘High Obstruction Housing’ if less than 50% of dwellings have purpose-made off-street parking/garaging facilities.

‘Off-street parking’ may include parking within the property boundary which are capable of being used by present-day average family cars; specially formed parking bays and garage courts located adjacent to the highway, or areas of hard standing on grassed areas comprising engineered cellular concrete blocks designed to provide vehicle parking areas.

In areas where houses have been subdivided into flats, or houses in multiple occupation, the calculation should be based on the number of dwellings present, not the number of buildings.

In these areas, there is a high risk of mechanical channel sweeping operations being obstructed.

Medium Obstruction Housing Areas

Housing areas should be classified as ‘Medium Obstruction Housing’ if:

more than 50% of swellings have purpose-made off-street parking/garaging facilities for 1 or 2 family cars.

Note: Medium Obstruction Housing is a broad and varied category. One way of looking at it is that if a housing area does not meet the criteria for High Obstruction Housing, and also does not fall within the Low Obstruction category, then it must be Medium Obstruction Housing).

Low Obstruction Housing Areas

This Land Use Class includes all types of housing where more than 50% of dwellings have purpose-made off-street parking/garaging facilities within the property boundary for three or more family cars.

In these areas, there is generally a low risk of mechanical channel sweeping operations being obstructed.

The parking should be capable of accommodating all the parking requirements of residents (including, where applicable, boats and caravans etc.) and most of the demand from visitors to the premises.

This definition includes maisonettes and flats, regardless of tenure, if the parking is contained within the property curtilage.

In Low Obstruction Housing Areas, it is likely that there will be few or no vehicles parked on-street, and significant on-street parking is the exception rather than the rule.

Industry, Warehousing, Retail Sheds and Science Parks

This Class includes industrial and warehousing developments; out-of-town retail parks (including food and non-food developments); and science parks (containing offices, laboratories and manufacturing processes), which contain land that is owned or managed by the local authority, and which is freely accessible to the public. Only areas of ‘relevant land’ should be included in the NI 195 survey.

Public roads running through hospital and university campuses should also be included in this category.

Main Roads

Throughout rural areas (except where main roads run through larger settlements containing Main and Other Retail and Commercial Areas and High Obstruction Housing Areas);

In urban areas, except where main roads run through Main and Other Retail and Commercial Areas, or through High Obstruction Housing Areas where no selective demolition has taken place (see below);

In High Obstruction Housing Areas in urban areas where selective demolition has taken place in order to create a wider, often landscaped, main road corridor;

Rural Roads

This Class comprises all adopted highways that are located outside built up areas and which are not otherwise included in the Main Roads or Other Highways Land Use Classes. With these exceptions, this land use covers all roads outside built up areas, whether 'rural' in character or not.

Some authorities, because they are heavily built up, may believe that they do not contain ‘rural roads’. In fact, there are very few authorities that have no roads at all, that fit into this category.

Some roads on the edge of built up areas have agricultural land on one side, and development on the other. Where the development has no access to the road e.g. there is continuous fencing or hedging, treat this as a rural road. Where the development does have access, allocate the road to the same category as the adjacent land use.

Other Highways

Formal and informal lay-bys on main and rural roads; pedestrian overbridges and underpasses; redway (dual purpose cycleway/footpath – as in Milton Keynes); narrow roads within housing areas - often referred to by local names, such as ‘ginnels’, ‘snickets’, ‘snickleways’, six-foots’ and ‘ten-foots,’ except where these provide rear access to terraced housing. Normally, this type of pathway is adopted and is usually closely bounded by walls and/or other boundary structures. Such alleyways need to be at least 25m in length to constitute a transect.

The first 50 metres of BOATs (Byways Open To All Traffic), RUPPS (Roads Used As Public Paths) – or Restricted Byways, where the latter have been reviewed, and bridleways leading from metalled public highways;

Redundant highway infrastructure still accessible to the public, including stub access roads to future development sites;

Recreation Areas

This Land Use Class includes a wide range of open spaces that are freely accessible to the public and which are maintained by a local authority. Sites include parks, picnic sites, canals, lakes, riversides; municipal cemeteries (but not churchyards) and cycleways (excluding cycleways classified as ‘Other Highways’ – see above).

Where town squares and plazas are present within Main Retail and Commercial Areas and are predominantly ‘greenspace’ – i.e. contain over 50% of grassed, treed and shrubbed areas – they should be surveyed as Recreation Areas.

Notes: Many canal towpaths are excluded because they do not comprise Relevant Land for a principal litter authority. For the avoidance of doubt, beaches are not included in the NI 195 Survey.

Where the ownership of Recreational Land has been transferred from a Borough or District Council to a Town or Parish Council, this is no longer relevant land for the purposes of BVPI 199, and should be excluded. However, where Town or Parish Councils only manage land on behalf of the local authority (which retains ownership), then such land remains relevant land and should be included in the NI 195 return.

A selection of five target wards is used for each four monthly survey period over a three year span. Using the methods described below each section of target wards will be comparable one with another, as far as is possible and all wards in a district will be sampled in a planned rotation.

What is a Transect?
A 'transect' is a name given to an area of relevant land or highway that is sampled as part of a Cleanliness NI 195 survey, and on which a grade is given for litter and another for detritus. There are broadly two types of transect; one on highway sites and the other on recreation and other open areas

Transect on Highways (Streets)
A transect on a highway is normally 50 metres land, extending the whole width of the street or highway form backline to backline. It will include footways, road channels, carriageways pedestrian refuges, splitter islands, central reservations, and may also include landscaped areas such as verges, grassed areas, shrubbed areas, planters, tree pits, and the bases of hedges and fences that bound areas of relevant land or highway

Transects on Recreation Areas and Other Open Spaces
Transects may take different forms in Recreation Areas and other open spaces. Along footways crossing such spaces, transects should normally be 50 metres long, and extend 2 metres onto grassed or other areas that lie either side of the path. On larger open areas, such as sports fields and play areas, transects should not exceed 50 metres on either axis.

Litter Grading
Litter includes mainly synthetic materials, often associated with smoking, eating and drinking, that are improperly discarded and left my members of the public; or are spilt during waste management operations. Litter may also include putrescrible or clinical wastes, or faeces such as dog, bird and other animal faeces

Detritus Grading
Detritus comprises dust, mud, soil, grit, gravel, stones, rotted leaf and vegetable residues, and fragments of twigs, glass, plastic and other finely divided materials. Detritus includes leaf and blossom falls when they have substantially lost their structure and have become mushy or fragmented.

Grade A is clean

- no litter or refuse

- no detritus present

Grade B is light

- predominantly free of litter except

- predominantly free of detritus for some small items; except for some small items

Grade C is significant

- widespread distribution of litter

- widespread distribution of detritus, with minor accumulations

Grade D is heavy

- heavy litter, with significant accumulations.

- heavy detritus, with significant accumulations.