Croydon ULEZ vandals saw and pull down entire lamp post to knock out cameras

Croydon ULEZ vandals saw and pull down entire lamp post to knock out cameras (Image: HK CERAMICS) Vandals have continued to wreck ULEZ infrastructure in London , with protesters attempting to fell cameras dotted around the capital’s outer boroughs. The newly expanded zone has prompted significant backlash from some outraged drivers, who have taken to the streets over the last few days to impede – or, in some cases, destroy – cameras used to enforce the ULEZ. Pictures have shown the devices doused with paint, obscured with cement, covered with bags, and even detached from their roadside posts. Now, protesters appear to have gone further, with one camera-bearing lamppost seen sawn clean in half. The criminal damage has been supported by Conservative MPs, who have said they are “happy for them to do it”. Vandals dubbed “blade runners” by those within the anti-ULEZ community, sawed an entire lamppost in half on Sundale Avenue in Selsdon, Croydon. The post, which was opposite a local school, was left collapsed on the pavement just days before pupils returned from their summer holidays. The incident is not the only one of its kind, with other lampposts left toppled on Mount Road in Chessington and Tolworth Rise North in Surbiton. Police have recorded hundreds of attacks on ULEZ infrastructure this year, which have reportedly ramped up since the zone was expanded last week. The Metropolitan Police said it recorded a total of 510 crimes, among them 159 reports of camera thefts and 351 of camera damage, between April 1 and August 31 this year. A quarter of cameras are now reportedly damaged, crowd-sourced maps show, with 450 of the 1,762 marked as damaged or missing as campaigners protest the ULEZ requirement that owners of cars that don’t meet new emissions standards to pay £12.50 a day to drive in London. The Mayor of London has previously denounced the vandalism, stating it qualifies as “criminal damage”. In response to a question from Tory councillor Peter Fortune earlier this year, he said that “whatever one thinks of the ULEZ policy”, he “would hope we would all agree that those who steal equipment or wilfully cause criminal damage should face the appropriate criminal penalties”. But Conservatives have publicly supported the acts of vandalism in recent days, with Tory MP Sir Iain Duncan Smith saying: “A lot of people in my constituency have been cementing up the cameras or putting plastic bags over them. “I am happy for them to do it because they are facing an imposition that no one wants, and they have been lied to about it.”