Internet approach to tackle dog fouling

Councillor Sean Marshall appealed to the Dumfries and Galloway Council to run an electronic monitoring scheme for all dog bins in the two towns.
And he said: “I have been in contact with the neighbourhood manager Nicola Simpson over possibly getting more bins or coming up with a solution to Eastriggs and Annan’s dog fouling problem.
“However, cost was a problem, and I was shocked to discover that Eastriggs alone already had 41 dog bins.
“So as a solution a pilot scheme is being run to plot where every dog bin is in the two towns, much like we do with grit bins, and this information will be available on the Internet.”
The scheme should allow dog walkers to see where their nearest bin is, and hopefully allow the problem areas for dog fouling to be targeted by possible relocating of bins.
However it is hoped that the plotting itself should allow dog walkers to become aware of where their nearest bins are, removing the temptation to allow their dog to foul and inevitably reducing the amount of dog foul on the streets.
A spokesman for the council said: “We’ve been exploring the idea of plotting dog bins using our GIS Mapping systems on the Council website.
“We will do this for the Annan, Eastriggs and Moffat areas as a pilot.
“This work will be planned in and carried out in due course.
“Our Vouncil receive requests for extra dog bins on a regular basis, but we simply do not have the resources to install and then empty extra bins.
“We hope the mapping will allow us to have a visual display of where bins are, and will allow us to respond to demand and perhaps reposition some of the bins.”