The southern French city of Perpignan has removed dozens of public benches over the past month in a bid to prevent “the nuisance” of people sleeping on them. Critics accuse the city of deliberately targeting the homeless, reports FRANCE 24.
The removal of the benches comes just weeks after another French town, Angoulême in central France, mounted steel cages around many of its public benches to prevent drunks and homeless people from “monopolising” them. After a storm of criticism, however, the cages were “temporarily” removed on December 26.
In Perpignan, however, several dozen public benches have been completely removed in the past few weeks.
Pierre Barat, a Perpignan deputy mayor in charge of urban planning, confirmed that some of the city’s benches had been removed “because some resident associations had complained of the nuisance at night stemming from all sorts of people, not just the homeless”.
He said some benches would be replaced with concrete-style seats that would allow for a brief rest, but wouldn’t encourage people to occupy them for any longer periods of time.