Crimes rampant in ByWard Market

Re: Will CCTV cameras in the ByWard Market help curb violent crime? Hardly, Sept. 10.

The article focused almost exclusively on violent crime and murder in public view. As a perennial ByWard Market classical music busker, I don’t need high-tech resolution and a panoramic view to see the growing plethora of lesser and non-violent crimes slowly killing off one of Canada’s oldest and most beloved public spaces.

Your article on CCTV cameras made almost no mention of the panhandling, the solicitation, the prostitution, the public intoxication, the indecent exposure, the flouting of public smoking bylaws, the loitering, the vandalism, the gang activity, the swarmings, the car and bicycle theft, the drug dealing, the shoplifting, the pocket picking, the purse snatchings, the burglary, the common assault, the mugging, the graffiti, the noise and stink of gratuitous street racing from muscle cars and motorcycles, the constant moving violations of traffic, the teen runaways, or the occasional lost child that are daily specials on the ByWard Market menu.

In a letter published earlier this year in The Citizen, I tried to contrast the security on Sparks Street with the lack of security in the ByWard Market. Never did I infer that high-tech on a pole would replace humans on the ground in the fight against all varieties of street crime. Rather, what I suggested was that CCTV was another much-needed tool. Sparks Street learned that lesson decades ago and is simply safer for it. Thomas Brawn, Orléans