Litter

[Mike 84C]

Been out with my bin bags and litter picking stick today and if this small part of Lincolnshire that I live in is a snapshot of England then this is a B-filthy island we live on. What gives the great British public the right to lob rubbish straight out of their car windows? MaccyD bags with all the empty food containers put back in the brown bag and YO that's gone in the dyke. And the number of drink cans of all descriptions drivers are either under the influence of alcohol or high as kites on caffine. Bring back random breathalyzers  I say.

  Best stop as  I'm not really a moaning old git, or not much! Dare I ask how others feel?

[sjp23480]

I find that most people respect the environment and dispose of their waste properly.  Unfortunately, like most things, it is the few that spoil it for the many. 

 

Imagine how much more litter there would be if we all adopted the minority approach.   I think what is shocking is the sheer volume of waste created by a single person, let alone a car full.  I have often thought about getting a bag of MaccyD/KFC/Burger King/ PizzaHut/Dominoes/etc waste and dumping it on their doorstep or better still blocking their drive-thru lanes - which are the biggest sources of litter.

 

Rant over.

 

[ikcdab]

We are not the only ones.  A while ago I drive through France, Switzerland and Italy,  in that order.  France and Italy were waste and rubbish-strewn holes. Crossing the border to switzerland was like incredible, the litter and rubbish just stopped.

Japan had this the best.  There are no public litter bins anywhere and everybody takes their litter home.  The streets are pristine.  But then again, Japanese culture is totally different....

[sjp23480]

One of the worst locations for litter in my town are where lorries park overnight, the litter (amongst other things) in these areas is nothing short of appalling.   What do they do in Switzerland to stop this behaviour?

[Ramblin Rich]

Agree. It's another symptom of the "I'm alright, the world owes me, someone else's problem" mindset. It's especially noticeable when the hedges have been cut back just how much was under the plant growth.

I get really annoyed with the stories of open countryside eg Dartmoor being trashed by parties. Half the people claim to be vegan, animal loving types but can't keep be bothered to keep their surroundings tidy. They just (.....) off and leave the wardens to pick up afterwards. 

[DIW]

1 hour ago, sjp23480 said:

One of the worst locations for litter in my town are where lorries park overnight, the litter (amongst other things) in these areas is nothing short of appalling.   What do they do in Switzerland to stop this behaviour?

They make the lorries go on the trains!

[jcm@gwr]

They need to automatically print the reg number on all the food packaging

that you get in a drive-through, that might reduce the problem, or at least

make it easier to find and fine them!

[sjp23480]

12 minutes ago, jcm@gwr said:

They need to automatically print the reg number on all the food packaging

that you get in a drive-through, that might reduce the problem, or at least

make it easier to find and fine them!

Not sure that would be enough to make anything stick

[jcm@gwr]

20 minutes ago, sjp23480 said:

Not sure that would be enough to make anything stick

 

But it's a step in the right direction

[simontaylor484]

Up until early retirement due to Ill health i worked as a cleansing operative for my local council. A lot of the cause of littering is just sheer idleness why bother to put litter in a bin 2 to 3 steps away when you could just throw it on the floor. There was one particular road on our patch that left a housing estate and went to rural area we used to pick the verge every couple of months it was always 6 or 7 bin bags full of the same brand of wine bottles and  various bags of beer cans.

 

The high school on our patch is the only one in the district that let their pupils out at dinner time you could follow the horde going back from the shop or town centre and pick up 3 sacks of rubbish a day despite passing at least 6 bins that were emptied daily so they had no.excuse. 

[Georgeconna]

Symptom of Society now I feel, Kids told about this in school but I see 10 year olds with thier Monster cans and 15 mins later its chucked on the road side. Also you have the  My car is nice and clean so feic the rubbish out of of window brigade. Ireland is also Strewn with plastic bottles, Cans, Recyclable material amongst other crap. It is depressing to take a walk down the country lanes these days given there is so much. Even a crate of untouched Glass Bottles of beer I Found too on the roadside. Flat Screens in Rivers.... .I can go on...

[ejstubbs]

The litter that really depresses me these days is discarded face masks.  Do they just not get the point, or do they really not give a flying f-f-ferret?

 

But yes, takeaway food detritus probably forms the largest proportion of 'casual' litter, which is particularly annoying because so much of it is plastic - drink bottles, foam burger trays and the like - which doesn't biodegrade but breaks down in to microparticles which end up contaminating the entire planet.

 

Fly-tipping is another one.  And not just the old-sofa-dumped-in-a-layby kind.  Round my way there are a number of footpaths (aka ginnels, snickets, jitties etc etc) and small areas of greenery behind rows of residential properties.  Too many of the residents seem to regard these as being the correct place to dump their lawn clippings, pruning trimmings and other unwanted refuse from their own gardens.  There's also a liberal sprinkling of knackered vacuum cleaners and other broken or otherwise unwanted domestic stuff that the bin man won't take, and the owner is too lazy to take to the tip and too cheap to pay for uplift.  The attitude seems to be that once it's beyond their back gate it's no longer their problem (funnily enough, though, they don't seem to think the same way about the front of their property).  One of the most annoying cases is someone who has obviously uprooted a washing pole or fence post or something of that ilk and dumped the sizeable concrete foundation block on the narrow path.  Helpful.  Not.

[Pete the Elaner]

Discarded masks annoy me. Making only more expensive re-usable ones would not work because you would simply get more people making an excuse for being exempt of wearing one. I already had a pile of bandanas so I simply use those instead & put them in the wash when I get home & have not managed to lose one yet.

 

I was out running the other day & passed someone litter collecting so stopped for a quick chat. She had almost filled an entire bag in 40 minutes & said that among the rubbish were 2 nappies.

Surely nobody has done a nappy change outdoors this weather? Taking your rubbish out to just throw it is quite horrible.

 

[Reorte]

Big pile of rubbish bags appeared in a layby near me over the weekend...

 

Am I getting (even more) grumpy as I get older or is the litter problem getting worse? It's never been great in my lifetime.

 

At any rate it doesn't take much of a stretch of the imagination to see that there are a lot of people who really couldn't care less about the world they live in. Some might in abstract, academic terms but don't seem to in the actual reality.

[Pete the Elaner]

6 minutes ago, Reorte said:

Big pile of rubbish bags appeared in a layby near me over the weekend...

 

Am I getting (even more) grumpy as I get older or is the litter problem getting worse? It's never been great in my lifetime.

 

 

If you're getting grumpy as you get older then so am I!

I saw a sign on a post yesterday saying 'fly tippers, we're watching you'.

The refuse collectors are not fussy around my way either, so tidy disposal is easy. They even take glass bottles & empty garden waste from our green wheelie bins. The only items they won't take are large ones like furniture or washing machines. I see these dumped in common areas.

[Reorte]

16 minutes ago, Pete the Elaner said:

 

If you're getting grumpy as you get older then so am I!

I saw a sign on a post yesterday saying 'fly tippers, we're watching you'.

The refuse collectors are not fussy around my way either, so tidy disposal is easy. They even take glass bottles & empty garden waste from our green wheelie bins. The only items they won't take are large ones like furniture or washing machines. I see these dumped in common areas.

This was pretty close to me:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-derbyshire-56054724

 

As it says though it's not an obvious fly tipping spot, because although there's a road near the top it's still going to be a ridiculous effort to lug them up from there.

[Pete the Elaner]

6 minutes ago, Reorte said:

This was pretty close to me:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-derbyshire-56054724

 

As it says though it's not an obvious fly tipping spot, because although there's a road near the top it's still going to be a ridiculous effort to lug them up from there.

 

That's crazy.

It would have been easier to take them to the local landfill site & fail to see any satisfaction would be gained from heaving them to such a place.

When I last had my washing machine replaced, I asked for my old one to be disposed of. I may have paid a little extra for this, but I considered this to be part of the cost of replacing the old one.

[Steamport Southport]

That'll be some lads from the local rugby club or students....

[caradoc]

A couple of years ago in Largs we approached a car parked with two young men inside eating pizza and chips. As we passed them one dropped the empty boxes and cans onto the road right in front of us and they drove off. I was too astounded to get the car number (not that it would have made any difference anyway). 

 

Every day on my local exercise walks there is more litter to be seen, mostly bottles and cans but yesterday also a load of shredded tinfoil on a grassy area. I pick up what I can/dare to touch. 

 

And last week my wife stopped to thank a lady she has seen a couple of times clearing a roadside verge; The lady said that even while she is doing that, people in passing cars throw more litter from their vehicles. 

 

One solution might be to charge a litter levy on takeaway food and drink packaging, which would be ringfenced to paying for litter clearance. 

[Reorte]

6 minutes ago, caradoc said:

A couple of years ago in Largs we approached a car parked with two young men inside eating pizza and chips. As we passed them one dropped the empty boxes and cans onto the road right in front of us and they drove off. I was too astounded to get the car number (not that it would have made any difference anyway).

It might've made a difference. My mum got rather angry when she saw some teenagers drop a half-eaten portion of chips out of a car window and reported it to the police. She was a bit surprised that the police took her seriously, and she later got a call to say they'd been around to a house and given them (well, the car owner anyway) an earful, with the result of furious parents (furious at their daughter, not the police).

[Rugd1022]

Littering and fly tipping seriously boil my urine - I see so much of it on the railway, pick almost any overbridge in the West Midlands and sure enough there will be heaps of rubbish gathering on the ground either side of it, everything from bursting bin bags full of general waste to mattresses, bicycles, white goods and unwanted sofas. A case in point is the huge girder bridge that spans the GW route and the A45 at Small Heath, there's a Netowrk Rail access gate to the railway there which is a regular spot for fly tipping, no sooner does one pile of old tyres and furniture get removed by the council, than another pile appears in its place. Further down the line at St.Andrews (by the footie ground) it's even worse, the deep cutting there is slowly filling up with discarded sh*t. 

[StuAllen]

Im not trying to excuse poor lazy behaviour, but could the increase in fly tipping be linked to how busy the local recycling centres at? Our local one in Burgess Hill regularly has hour long queues waiting to enter it, they also only allow West Sussex residents so you have to have ID with you. If you’ve been turned away for no ID are you really going to get your ID and come back to wait another hour. I should add that  I’ve alway got my ID when going and make sure I start queuing before it opens at the weekend to avoid the worst of it.

[jbqfc]

55 minutes ago, StuAllen said:

Im not trying to excuse poor lazy behaviour, but could the increase in fly tipping be linked to how busy the local recycling centres at? Our local one in Burgess Hill regularly has hour long queues waiting to enter it, they also only allow West Sussex residents so you have to have ID with you. If you’ve been turned away for no ID are you really going to get your ID and come back to wait another hour. I should add that  I’ve alway got my ID when going and make sure I start queuing before it opens at the weekend to avoid the worst of it.

 

in Crawley you now not oly have to have ID you also have to book a slot  to visit so this is not going to help 

John 

[ejstubbs]

3 hours ago, StuAllen said:

could the increase in fly tipping be linked to how busy the local recycling centres are?

 

Not round here; you have to book a slot before arrival via the council's web site.  The lead time isn't that long, though: I usually get a slot the following day, which is fine for my purposes (actually gives me time to make sure I have't forgotten anything!)  So I don't get the impression that our local tips are particularly busy.

 

The usual excuse for fly tipping round here is that the council now charge for uplift of anything that can't be taken in a bin.  What's not said, but seems to be implicit, is that the very notion of taking the stuff for proper disposal yourself is not to be countenanced.

[DaveF]

I sometimes think my bit of England is very different from many other places.

 

If I want to take something to the tip I have a pleasant ten minute drive, go straight in, reverse into a parking/unloading space, deposit the rubbish and leave.  If I am unsure which skip to use there is always someone there to ask.

 

A permit is needed for a van or trailer and there is a charge for large amounts of rubble etc.

 

I think I once had to wait for about five minutes when I went on a Bank Holiday.

 

David