Taking Flight in Piccadilly Gardens...

Pigeons have been inhabiting Manchester's Piccadilly Gardens for as long as I can remember. I'm going way back when there were actually gardens on the site. Sunken into the hollow left by the original Manchester Royal Infirmary's basement, these gardens were once hailed as the largest open green space in the city centre. Back in the seventies, and for many years later, I can remember thousands of feral pigeons roosting in the trees and descending on the area every day. Admittedly in those days the stench and mess created by the birds became a real problem.
The Piccadilly Gardens of today are much different after a major revamp in 2001/2002 (no doubt I'll re-visit this story at some future point) and although the pigeon numbers are far less than once they were, it appears that they are still a concern to authorities who are considering fining people who feed them. Other major cities,notably London, have adopted this attitude to rid public spaces of the birds. Opinion's are mixed, but for now at least, the birds continue to hang-out in Piccadilly.