Whether you live in a town, city or village, it’s likely that you have streets and rivers filled with litter, unless you are very fortunate. Obviously the onus is on each individual not to drop litter (and shops to not sell plastic packaging), but there are many ways that individuals, groups and councils can help to create litter-free communities. That usually starts with a mass zero-tolerance policy. By removing all existing litter (including litter that has been on the ground or in local streams for sometimes years), it creates a community placemaking pride, so it’s less likely that people will drop litter onto clean litter-free streets. Here is a simple list of things local councils can do, to create litter-free communities:
- Install quality litter bins everywhere, and empty them regularly. Same with recycling bins, there is no point in having them, but not emptying them regularly. Solar bins compact trash down if you can’t afford to send staff out every day to empty bins.
- Invest in better dog poop stations, which include free biodegradable poop bags, in case people forget. This costs less than sending out council workers to clean up poop afterwards.
- Serve litter abatement orders on people who won’t clean up litter. You must clean up litter on public land (no matter who dropped it). But you can serve litter abatement orders on people on private land.
- Don’t mow grass verges of highways until you’ve cleaned up litter, otherwise this just sends shards of glass & plastic flying everywhere. Clean up first, then mow.
- Reduce cigarette litter by providing proper bins (especially now that smoking indoors is banned). Ballot Bin is proven to reduce cigarette butt litter by up to 73%. No Butts offers smoking shelters that are specially designed for butts not to fly away in the wind (also for offices, these can minimise fire risks from discarded butts).
- The Gumdrop Bin is an ingenious invention to stop gum litter (the same company also makes a personal gum bin that once full, can be sent off using a freepost label, to get discounts on new ones). This bin takes 500 pieces of gum, and can be mounted to the wall or to posts in shopping malls, football stadiums, supermarkets, car parks or anywhere else. This also helps keep dogs safe (xylitol sweetener in discarded gum can be lethal, and has a sweet taste).
- Set up a local litter clean-up group with help from CleanupUK (which lists helpful resources on where to buy litter pick-up kits. For beach clean-ups, Surfers Against Sewage has good info including the law and how to get involved.
Be inspired by the Devon town of Modbury, and create a plastic-bag free town. No council involvement is needed. Just get the local media involved, send everyone a free cloth bag and ask local businesses to sell items in reusable bags or compostable pots. That’s what happened in this small town, and the entire town was plastic-bag-free within a month, even the local supermarket got involved. The town also created a plastic bag amnesty, with donated bags sent off to be made into plastic garden benches.
