Roadside litter

GrantMO · Feb 23, 2002

Do you guys get much litter along your property? We only have about 750 feet of frontage but I pick up a bag of trash about every month. I think people around here litter more than other places.

s1120 · Feb 23, 2002

Na, I get it also. I have about 350ft of frontage and I could fill a bag every few weeks. I am hoping it lets up a bit when it looks like someone lives there.

rancar · Feb 23, 2002

This also is common on rural upstate New York roads. We have 1,400' road frontage. My wife and I go out at least twice a year (I refuse to do it more than that). We fill a good 5-6 5gal buckets, maybe more, of soda cans, beer cans, fast food wrappers, tires, bags of household garbage lazy and cheap people dump because they don't want to pay to get rid of it, even guts, skins, and heads of deer taken during hunting season. /w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif This last item we leave for nature to do its thing. I also climb down the embankments to retrieve garbage down there. One of last times I did this, I got entangled in poison oak or sumac. Scratched for weeks, wasn't happy. /w3tcompact/icons/mad.gif We've come to accept this as part of living in the country or anywhere for that matter. The road does look better afterwards. /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

Thomas · Feb 23, 2002

Yep..sure get my fair share of litter. /w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif
Since I live on a one way in and out road at a intersection,I'm sure 90% of the litter comes from people that live on this hill side. /w3tcompact/icons/mad.gif

RobertN · Feb 23, 2002

My son found all kinds of junk on the 1.2 miles of private rounds in our neighborhood. He went out to pick up as part of his Cub Scout Wolf badge stuff.

It's bad enough on the public roads, but this is our neighbors being junky...

Anonymous Poster · Feb 23, 2002

I hate litter, so I always notice whenever I see anything being thrown out of a car or truck. I would say that around here I see trash blow out of the bed of a pickup twice as often as I see someone throw it out of a window. Anyone that throws wrappers or cans in the truck bed might as well throw it on the side of the road.

Andy

Boondox · Feb 23, 2002

We used to get a bit of McDonald's trash from folks ordering take out and driving up here to eat surrounded by nature...then leaving their trash. But the McTrash closed due to insufficient business last week, so we only get the occasional beer bottle now.

Pete

JoeR · Feb 23, 2002

I have seen trash blow out of pickup trucks too. When I worked at Disney World, I would park my truck in the employee lot for my 8-10 hour shift. One day, I leave work and get up to 55mph when I see trash flying out of the bed of my truck. People walking through the parking lot dumped trash in the bed of my truck!! You would not believe how often that happens. This was not isolated to Disney either. I was at college one day, and once again someone left a Burger King bag in the bed of the truck. People don't want the trash in their car, but they will put it into you truck!! The people who dump on the side of the road, are probably the same people who couldn't find a pickup truck to put it into first...

On another note, I get irate when I see people empty their ahstrays at a stop light. Can't they empty them into a trashcan whem they are getting gas??

Joe

turnkey4099 · Feb 23, 2002

I live right on US195. Used to the trash in the ditches. The worst was one day I hear a car pull off to the side in my driveway a minute and then leave. I walk around the house and find the mctrash bag sitting right in the middle of the drive.

Harry K

rancar · Feb 24, 2002

Yep, I find the same thing with my pick-up Andy. Trash in the back /w3tcompact/icons/sad.gif.

StoneHeartFarm · Feb 24, 2002

We have weekly trash pick up here. So, one morning the wife is leaving for work and here's a couple of flatlanders out at the end of our drive unloading trash bags from the back of their minivan and throwing them down with our trash. Since the limit is 5 bags and these guys had about a dozen, the wife stopped to find out what was going on. (Besides, they were blocking the end of our drive.) After a heated discussion in which they were told we wanted $20.00 per bag for every one they left, they picked it all back up, put it in the van and drove off in a huff, mad because we wouldn't store their trash for them. It's terrible that the wife made them carry their trash all the way home. /w3tcompact/icons/eyes.gif

SHF

rancar · Feb 24, 2002

Steve,

Your wife has nerve and guts to face these guys off. You should give her flowers and take her out to dinner. Sounds like she saved you at least $240 /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif. In other circumstances, these guys may have taken advantage of her. Her quick, responsive action is something that should be praised.

Regards,
Bob Ancar
Cambridge, NY

StoneHeartFarm · Feb 24, 2002

rancar

Nobody takes advantage of her if they know what's good for them. It's like tangling with a Wolverine, not a real wise thing to do. /w3tcompact/icons/shocked.gif She's got nerve, guts and a great big stick!

SHF

markcg2000 · Feb 24, 2002

Never happened to me, but...
A co-worker from Buffalo told me this one. Late at night he hears a truck pull up outside. Curious, he quietly goes out to see what they're doing. They are unloading a truck full of asbestos shingles ( I think that's what it was). Anyhow, he sneaks around to the road-side, sticks a match in the air-valve of both the tires, then gets back inside and calls the cops /w3tcompact/icons/grin.gif. Cost them quite a fine!

Mosey · Feb 25, 2002

People are amazing

People are amazing sometimes. We were sitting in the front yard at the farm where I grew up and somebody pulled up and started to take an old milk can that was laying in the weeds next to a barn. My Dad went over and asked them what they were doing. They said "it didn't look like you were using it, so we thought we'd take it". He told them to put it back and get lost.

Thomas · Feb 25, 2002

Re: People are amazing

Yep they sure can be..kinda like when they take stones from a stone wall.."but you have so many"..then you explain its against the law.
I wonder how they would feel if one stop and started picking flowers etc..from there flower garden. /w3tcompact/icons/eyes.gif

Charlie_Iliff · Feb 25, 2002

Re: People are amazing

The ones I like best are those with a pickup and chain saw who are sure that all private woods are maintained for the sole purpose of providing them with firewood.

patrickg · Feb 25, 2002

I have a mile of public road frontage, that is, a half of a mile of state highway and half a mile of gravel road. We are a mile from two gas station mini-marts that serve drinks in throw away cups. We get the west bound cups as our frontage is from a half mile to one mile west. Given the quantity of ice versus drink, our frontage spans the zone of highest probability of drink completion, given they start on it before driving off. We also get beverage cans, bottles, and the general junk tossed from cars. By far I hate glass containers the most and would back a nationwide 25 cent minimum deposit on ALL glass containers, beverage, pickles, or whatever. Then they would be valuable enough to keep them from being tossed and if they were there would be interest in picking them up.
We also get plenty of fast food wrappers in the general general debris. I would love to have the chance to photograph the miscreant's lisc plates as a local deputy sheriff assures me that with such proof he would personally deliver their trash to them along with a verbal warning regarding litter laws.
The gravel road is only a mile long and the first half is my frontage. There are 3 families down it past me and they share a dumpster and have no reason to litter, yet there are beer cans and the occasional discarded used diaper. The bozos turn off the highway and stop at the first place they can get of the road, the gate where my mailbox is and will soon become the entry point to my private drive to my new house. The beer cans are distributed along my 1/2 mile but are concentrated at two of my gates as they are inset and there is room to get off the road to park and drink. There will be an unwanted outcome for the tresspasser if/when I catch someone in the act.
Worse is the ones that park blocking my gate, climb over it with their family and kids and have a picknic spreading trash around a beautiful pond in full view of my mom's new house's picture window and get miffed when you suggest they leave taking their trash with them.

Alternate short answer: Yeah we get litter, too.

Patrick

Wal · Feb 25, 2002

Grant,

It isn't any better on THIS side of the state /w3tcompact/icons/mad.gif.

I think all us neat people would agree on one thing:
THERE ARE FAR TO MANY SLOBS. And I don't think it makes a dang bit of difference where you're located.