Canterbury’s Students, Nightlife and HMOs

By Emma__R | Thursday, October 14, 2010, 01:09

We’re a month into the new term and the debate is on once more – should residents have to be subjected to sleepless nights in the name of “education”?

Clearly, not every student is a lout. But to a very vocal minority, a degree is all about alcohol consumption. I know this because I was a student once, and a fair few of my contemporaries hazarded their way to an honours degree through a perpetual cycle of Sambuca and Paracetamol. (Take the vomit-splattered pavement outside a certain pub on the morning after their cheap student night as harder evidence.)

As you leave the UKC campus, there are signs which state something along the lines of, ‘this is a residential area. Please respect our neighbours and keep noise to a minimum.’ But in the darkness and the highs of inebriated bliss, I doubt there are many who heed the signs. I don’t mean to be picking on the UKC students; I just don’t have much call to venture down to the Christ Church or UCA end of town.

I have a feeling that part of the problem is a lack of communication between the university and the residents. No one is trying to deny the value of Universities and the cultural and economic benefits they bring – but shouldn’t we also be standing up for the value of an uninterrupted night’s sleep? Very few residents, as far as I know (I can only name @savecanterbury on twitter), are prepared to stick up for residents, and I respectfully doubt that twitter (which limits posts to 140 characters) is really the best place to put forward a reasoned argument about a complex issue.

The council plans limit the number of HMOs in any given area in Canterbury. Perhaps this will go some way to solving the problem (although this isn’t their apparent motivation), but perhaps this will create divisions and sour relations between students and residents.

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We own a bed and breakfast in Canterbury, this is our full time job and income. It has now become very difficult for our customers to sleep, especially on a Friday night due to the quantity of student accommodation in the immediate area. The student population who decide it is ok to drink, scream and behave like packs of wolves on their way home in the early hours are damaging our business and giving Canterbury a bad reputation for tourism. There does not seems to be any control over it, we need police or University marshalls like they have in Oxford and Cambridge. Everyone is entitled to a good time, but others should not have to suffer for it. Where tourism is concerned, word gets around about nice places to visit and those which are not so nice.....

By SadBnB at 12:02 on 25/10/10
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Oh, and thanks for the imagery. The term 'vomit-splattered' just put me off my sandwich!

By Jen_Beard at 15:04 on 16/10/10
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Hmm, from what I hear the proposed regulation of HMOs has been met with pretty fierce opposition from the Student Unions. I take their point that it feels like discrimination against students, but it also makes sense that a high concentration of HMOs would bring the value of the neighbourhood down. I'm sitting on the fence on this one.

I was kept up the other night by drunken men in the street below my window. They were about 50 - definitely not students. I know that this is a very inaccurate and unofficial way of measuring which demographic makes the most noise, but surely it's unfair to point fingers?

Presumably, Kent Police deal with noise complaints. If there was some way to make people accountable for ther inconvenience they cause to others at night, it might ease the tension. Of course, that costs money. And right now, I think it should be carefully considered whether or not this is one of our biggest problems.

By Jen_Beard at 14:55 on 16/10/10
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