High Court

Published date01 October 2001
DOI10.1177/002201830106500501
Date01 October 2001
Subject MatterHigh Court
High
Court
Liability
for Offence
of
Public
Nuisance
Wandsworth
LRe
vRailtrack pIc [2000]1 WLR 368
'This case is
about
pigeon
droppings:
Gibbs Jdisarmingly
opened
the
judgment
of
the
court
with
this simple
statement
of fact.
It
gave rise to
aquestion of law
which
was posed
with
equal
simplicity,
although
the
determination
of
that
question gave rise to a
number
of complexities.
The pigeon droppings had, it was agreed, caused apublic nuisance. The
question before
the
High Court was:
'Who
had
committed this offence of
public nuisance
and
was therefore
under
aliability to abate it?' Was it
the
local council,
who,
as
highway
authority,
owned
the
land
on
which
the
nuisance existed? Or was it Railtrack plc,
which
owned
the
adjacent
premises from
which
the
nuisance
emanated?
Railtrack
owned
the
bridge
which
permitted
railway trains to cross a busy
South
London
highway
(Balham High Street).
It
was in good repair
and
was well
managed, doing its
job
as a necessary
part
of London's transport system.
The pigeons roosted
and
nested
on
the
girders
and
ledges
on
the
under-
side of
the
bridge, forming
the
'ceiling' above
the
roadway
and
footpaths
below. The testimony given for
the
local
authority
and
for
the
company
left no
doubt
as to
the
'substantial discomfort'
and
inconvenience caused
to
the
members
of
the
public
who
had
to use
the
road
and
the
footpaths
under
the
bridge. It was
not
only
that
the
footpaths
were
slippery
and
dangerous
(and, indeed,
one
elderly
woman
fell
and
suffered severe
injuries),
but
the
experts said
that
there
was a
danger
to
health
arising
from
the
possibility of members of
the
public contracting psittacosis from
the
birds,
although
it was
eventually
conceded
that
this risk was so slight
that
it was
better
ignored in
any
consideration of
the
nuisance.
Both
the
company
and
the
local
authority
had
attempted
to deal
with
this situa-
tion. The
company
had
tried to keep
out
the
birds
with
wire netting,
but
this
had
failed. The local
authority
had had
expert advice
that
what
had
attracted
the
birds to roost
and
nest
under
the
bridge was proximity to
food. The bridge was
near
many
restaurants
and
'take-away'
establish-
ments,
and
the
members
of
the
public in
the
area ate
their
meals as
they
walked along
the
footpaths, discarding
on
to
the
footpaths
what
they
did
not
want.
The local council
had
engaged extra staff,
with
an
officer in
charge, in
an
attempt
to
keep
the
roads
around
the
bridge as free as
possible. They
had
identified those
members
of
the
public
who
fed
the
pigeons
with
grain
and
had
sent
them
'discouraging letters' (to no avail).
The additional cost of
the
extra cleansing measures was £10,000.
Mean-
while,
members
of
the
public
had
taken
their
own
counter-measures, by
running
from
one
end
of
the
footwalk to
the
other
under
the
bridge, to
minimise
the
damage.
But
all spoke of receiving
the
droppings
on
the
head
and
face
and
clothes,
which
had
to be dry-cleaned.
It
was
added
that
the
bridge was
near
to
the
building in
which
the
council received
visiting dignitaries
who
(owing to ignorance or age)
had
walked
under
363

To continue reading

Request your trial

VLEX uses login cookies to provide you with a better browsing experience. If you click on 'Accept' or continue browsing this site we consider that you accept our cookie policy. ACCEPT