AWALK along the canal in Worcester should always be a pleasurable experience but it’s not necessarily the case.

We’re blessed by a waterway that bisects the city from Diglis and then runs northwards on to Droitwich and ultimately to Birmingham. Many of us take full advantage of this fact and I actually know people who have walked the whole route from ‘Faithful’ City to Second City.

However, and I guess you knew there was a ‘but’ coming, a trip along the ‘cut’ can sometimes turn sour. This year has witnessed several attacks on people – in the Lansdowne area alone, there have been six nasty incidents – and this prompted the police to step up patrols.

A number of local residents told this newspaper that they didn’t feel safe using the towpath. This is a truly shocking and sad state of affairs. Yet despite all the mounting evidence, a fully paid-up member of the ‘denial’ brigade wrote to the Worcester News accusing us of ‘sloppy journalism’ and basically hyping the whole thing up.

Six attacks and counting… there’s none so blind who can’t see.

Actually, I’m still waiting for this stupid woman to apologise to the hardworking hacks in Hylton Road and at least acknowledge this paper got its facts right. Mind you, I won’t be holding my breath.

But a number of people have gone on record about this problem and sadly it appears to be one that won’t go away in a hurry.

Only the other day, I had to thread my way through a group of drunks sprawled under the bridge near the Blockhouse. One of them shouted something in the usual mindless fashion and that was that. But why should we have to put up with these lowlifes in the first place?

And this was by no means an isolated occurrence. I’ve had to run the scumbag gauntlet several times down the years, particularly in the Arboretum area, a notorious blackspot.

The answer is – as ever – proper policing that involves action against these potentially threatening individuals.

For we’ll never get people out of their cars in gridlock Worcester while towpaths belong to thugs, drunks and layabouts. They should be reclaimed by the law-abiding majority… whether the denial brigade likes it or not.