St George’s Street paving gets a deep clean

Over the last week or so, Canenco have been hard at work cleaning the paved area in St George’s Street.

Aided by the arrival of a scrub deck machine, it’s looking in decent nick. Some final bits around the seats will be finished in the coming weeks, while chewing gum spot removal is ongoing.

All in all, a good job, done well, in difficult conditions.

Regrettably, however, we must admit defeat on the planters next to the benches in this area.

While undoubtedly the correct thing to have tried in the revamp of St George’s Street, the shrubs have simply not been able to survive with the amount of liquid going on them that should not have been.

We’re talking urine, alcohol, fizzy drinks and hot drinks. And then there’s the cigarette ends and general litter they were used for too, despite all the litter bins in that area.

So later this week, work will take place to remove the shrubs and fill the planters in as a temporary solution.

We are in discussions with the manufacturer of the existing benches about extending them to cover the areas where the planters were, but this work is unlikely to take place for some time.

It’s not how we wanted it to be, but having tried to make the planters work, it’s time to do something different.

We continue to work with businesses and the Canterbury BID team to look after St George’s Street and the wider city area.

Published: 22 July 2025