You’re not still harping on about the attack of the killer horse-chestnut trees, are you? They’ve all been cut down.

It was serious. I still bear the mark of the falling conker

Sounds like the title of a Sherlock Holmes mystery. However, the point is that our public spaces are becoming dull as ditchwater — soon to be drained to prevent slipping or some other freak accident.

So I shouldn’t have joined the local Uptight Society march against the menace of youths on skateboards?

Not according to Cabe Space, part of the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment, which says that skateboarders rarely hurt anyone; they just make a lot of noise and shine steps.

Too late, we banned them. And next week I’m out for Mothers against Swings

You should stay indoors and read What are we scared of? commissioned by Cabe Space about the dangers of eliminating risk from our public spaces.

But risk exists. I walked into a “STOP” sign yesterday

The reason that sign is there is that we’re overdoing it. In trying to eliminate risk from our roads, parks and pavements, we’re creating problems like lazy drivers who rely on signposting rather than paying attention, not to mention creating sterile places to live.

So there are ‘good’ risks?

Precisely. Good risk as opposed to endless shopping malls and streets where pedestrians are “protected” from mindlessly toppling into oncoming traffic by railings that are not dangerously pointy.

So we should build skate parks rather than banning spotty youths on boards?

That would be generous, but as Iain Borden, the director of the Bartlett School of Architecture at University College London, says, you could simply allow them to exist in the space next to you and “get something vibrant to look at besides shop windows”.

Vibrant? Try sulky and badly dressed

OK, but better a sulky skateboarder than a lager lout or fan of violent videos.

You win, but there goes my somewhere quiet to slurp a grande skinny latte

Cheer up, you’ll probably just have to walk round the corner, which will do you good.

Now who’s dictating the actions of others? Help, I’m being oppressed

Nonsense. You’re being liberated. You and everyone else can go out and do what they want regardless of risk.

You mean like an adult exercising free will?

Now you’re getting it.

www.cabe.org.uk

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