File:Rawlinson Terrace Planter - Midden.jpg

English: 30 January 2017. Rawlinson Terrace, Tottenham N17.

These round structures are part of a chicane to mark the edges of the parking bays. I'd guess that at one time someone imagined and designed them as an attractive feature which would hold plants or trees; to soften and green the streetscape. And maybe, once-upon-a-time, a well-intentioned design worked well.

Archeologists apply the word "midden" - also the phrase "kitchen midden"- to an old dump of domestic waste. These may contain utensils, perhaps fragments of pottery, animal bones, shells and discarded artifacts. The idea is to learn about the domestic lives of places after people have gone. About their diet and their customs.

The stuff dumped in this "planter" is nothing unusual. Cans, bottles, empty packets, and some unidentified rubbish (anyway, not identified by me) in the small blue plastic bags.

But perhaps it hints at neatness. As if passers-by (or maybe a small group of street drinkers?) 'read' the empty planter as a handy container to hold waste.

A sort of crumbling brick litter-bin.