While the council's strategy focuses on 'city cleansing', which costs ratepayers $180,000 a year, Williamstown Chamber of Commerce president Adrian Masterman-Smith has suggested a compromise.

He has flagged a legal mural

highlighting Hobsons Bay's sporting achievements along a main thoroughfare into Williamstown that is a haven for graffiti taggers. "For a long time there's been a fairly lengthy panel of graffiti all the way to our croquet club, and this is tagging and not the mural or artistic graffiti," Mr Masterman-Smith said.

"It's great to just paint over it, but it's too easy for the taggers in one night to undo hundreds of dollars of painting.

"Instead of keeping it as a canvas that's a liability, how about turning it into something positive? If artists have a sense of ownership, it doesn't become tagged by others."

A member of an "old school" Melbourne graffiti crew, who cannot be named, said a sporting mural could work if it had graffiti 'pieces' in between.

The graffitist, who now also creates legal murals, said he supported 'tagging' but not on private property or over other respected artists' work.

"It's called 'getting up'," he said.

"It's making you famous in a certain scene. Let's say you've got one [tag] every station, every line, or most trains have got your name on it - it's an accomplishment.

"Old-school writers have an unwritten law that it can only be done on public property, but what's happened recently is the new schoolers are tagging people's fences, cars - you name it.

"They need to look at getting graffiti artists to clean up graffiti [with legal art]. If there's something there that's respected by the community, it won't get tagged. By taking away the walls and making it illegal, that hasn't worked."

Jeremy Gaden, director of Newport's Substation, agrees there must be legal avenues provided.

"I think there is a big distinction between what we call street art and what is graffiti. I'm a big fan of street art and what we'd like to do at The Substation is find a legitimate way for people to express themselves.

"I'd like to see that artwork elevated to a higher level - graffiti for good, not evil."