Ramsgate’s Madeira Walk waterfall is foaming over again

Foaming waterfall Photo Trevor Shonk

Soap liquid has been dumped in the Madeira Walk waterfall in Ramsgate again.

Ramsgate mayor Trevor Shonk caught six girls dumping the foaming liquid into the newly refurbished waterfall at around 3.15pm today (February 24).

It has been reported to the area PC.

The waterfall was cleaned and refurbished last month. Work took place to clean and cut back overhanging vegetation  and lighting and pumps were repaired.

Photo Trevor Shonk

Thanet District Council cleared more than 10 bags of rubbish and debris thrown into the pond by members of the public including cans, plastic, washing up bottles and even bricks.

There were concerns raised that the work may have destroyed plants and wildlife including Great Crested Newts which Thanet council refuted.

The environmental concerns were reported to police and Natural England by Cllr Suzanne Brimm, who is vice chair of the CPRE (Campaign to Protect Rural England) Thanet branch.

The waterfall was last targeted with foaming agent in November. Thanet council says the cost of cleaning up the damage is around £1,000. Dyes and detergents can damage fountain parts as well as cause harm to plants and wildlife.

Refurbished Photo Brian Whitehead

The waterfall was created when, in 1894, the Borough Council of Ramsgate decided to welcome new visitors to the town by changing its appearance from that of a busy fishing port to one with picturesque gardens and promenades.

One of the first stages of the plan was to create a new road to wind up from the harbour to the East Cliff, to be called Madeira Walk.

James Pulham and Son carried out the work, making it look as if it had been cut through a steep gorge, with rocky ‘cliffs’ on either side.

They built the Pulhamite ‘rocks’ shoring up the steep banks of the gorge, including the artificial cascade of the waterfall.

11 Comments

  1. Same thing again & again. Some youths of today have absolutely no respect for anything/anyone, let alone any respect for themselves, they’re living up to the image they portray…… & to put it bluntly, Pathetic Scum Bags.

    • It isn’t the first and won’t be the last – I lived in Thanet for 64 years and it was always happening. Therefore not just the young people of today – no deterrent!!

  2. Maybe a bigger fence instead of those low railings would help but then if they really want to ruin something they will find a way. It does seem there is a minority of feral youths and some girls are even worse than the boys. They need to be made to pay to get it cleaned again and CCTV needs to be pointing in that direction to help identify those idiots who find it funny to destroy our heritage. The way society is going it doesn’t look good for the future !

  3. JUST GOES TO SHOW THESE GIRLS HAVE NO PRIDE IN THE AREA ESPECIALLY AS THE WATERFALL HAD JUST BEEN REFURBISHED IN TIME FOR THE 100 anniversary of womens rights festival in march…THEY ARE A DISGRACE TO THEIR SEX and all what women are fighting for today..

  4. If they find the people who done it ,they should be made to clear it up ,we are fed up with children trying to soil our beautiful water fall we were just commented how nice it looked this week,if it’s girls they should be named and shamed in our local rag.

  5. Councillor Brimm is Chairperson of the local CPRE!!?? I always had a soft spot for the Council for the Protection of Rural England. Protecting the beauties of the countryside etc, though I always worried that it was ignoring real needs for rural housing and tended to assume that farmers would protect the wildlife without too much oversight. Now I am having REAL worries about it if they have a UKIP?ex-UKIP/Independent UKIP ? councillor as the local chair. Really scraping the barrel and limiting their appeal.

    • Vice-chair actually, Keefogs, as clearly described in the article,and given that the CPRE is the CAMPAIGN, not council for the Protection of Rural England, perhaps your “soft spot” actually relates to your level of comprehension of the English language! I presume, as you are clearly prepared to criticise the person concerned but are actually completely unaware of her political status (which is actually totally independent), that you are, in fact, a wonderfully philanthropic individual who is active in the community, and, like Cllr. Brimm already making a positive contribution to our future environmental welfare. Or are you just a sad keyboard warrior with an overinflated ego and inability to read plain English?

  6. If you no who they are make them or their parents pay to clean it up or otherwise make the two girls clean it up

  7. Still confused re Councillor Brimm and the CPRE. Recently, the CPRE had an excellent initiative in which supporters were asked to identify local brownfield sites suitable for housing. In this way, the CPRE could save greenfield sites from being built on. I would have thought that the redundant airfield at Manston, like the similar one at Hawkinge, could be built on very promptly. But then I find that Councillor Brimm shares the idea that it should NOT be used but mothballed until somebody, somewhere, comes up with the money and the acceptable plan, to turn it back into an airport. Meanwhile, there are plans to build on agricultural land at the proposed “Manston Green ” site. So how can we reconcile the two different positions? Save the greenfield site or mothball the brownfield site? Which?

  8. TDC have known for years about a product that will stop this happening, it is a 100% natural additive, but they were not interested in using it. Or more likely paying the cost of it.

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