Tired of the Trash

I suppose execution is a bit extreme. So I’ll propose an alternative punishment for litterbugs. How about we conduct a lottery and the winner gets to pay a visit to a litterbug’s house and destroy some of their property? 

Forgive me, but I’m becoming quite perturbed at the profusion of refuse along our streets, roads and sidewalks and in our parks, yards and grassy terraces. Sure, some of the trash is undoubtedly inadvertent spillage — waste that blows from a can knocked over by animals or high winds and what have you. But I’m pretty confident in stating the vast majority of the crap assaulting my eyes and degrading the landscape is deposited intentionally by careless jerks.

Again tonight I was drawn to collect trash on my ride home from work. Again I focused on my little town, East Galesburg. Again I was fuming by the time I arrived at my driveway.

Today I was prepared: I brought a bag to fill with garbage rather than limiting myself to two handfuls, which would have been awkward while pedaling.  So, at the first sign of trash — just west of the Main Street underpass — I stopped, stooped and scooped up a plastic bottle. A little farther on, a flattened beer can. Then another bottle. And another. And another… More cans, the odd plastic wrapper, mangled remnants of a Styrofoam cup from Beck’s Express Mart.

There was plenty more, but my bag was quickly full. Yes, it is ironic that I complain of litter and then collect it in one of the most ubiquitous items of litter, the plastic grocery sack. But I collect those, too, and stuff them in the recycling barrel at Hy-Vee. The thing is, I see and pick up far more plastic bottles and aluminum cans than anything else. The bottles go to the recycling bin, the cans are cashed in at G&M Distributors (for about 35 cents a pound, or about a penny a can).

According to the Container Recycling Institute, “Around 899 thousand tons of PET plastic bottles were recycled nationwide in 2013, but more than two times as much PET was wasted: 2 million tons.”

Ecowatch.com lists “22 Preposterous Facts about Plastic Pollution.” Here are a few of them:

• In the Los Angeles area alone, 10 metric tons of plastic fragments—like grocery bags, straws and soda bottles—are carried into the Pacific Ocean every day.
• Over the last ten years we have produced more plastic than during the whole of the last century.
• 50 percent of the plastic we use, we use just once and throw away.
• Enough plastic is thrown away each year to circle the earth four times.
• The average American throws away approximately 185 pounds of plastic per year.
• The production of plastic uses around eight percent of the world’s oil production (bioplastics are not a good solution as they require food source crops).
• Americans throw away 35 billion plastic water bottles every year (source: Brita)
• Annually approximately 500 billion plastic bags are used worldwide. More than one million bags are used every minute.
• The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is located in the North Pacific Gyre off the coast of California and is the largest ocean garbage site in the world. This floating mass of plastic is twice the size of Texas, with plastic pieces outnumbering sea life six to one.
• One million sea birds and 100,000 marine mammals are killed annually from plastic in our oceans.

Now, I understand how hard it might be to give a hoot about a plastic island twice the size of Texas floating off the cost of California or a million dead sea birds (we don’t live anywhere near the ocean). But just bring it home. Take a look at our streets and lawns and highways and byways. All that damned plastic and paper and aluminum is just plain ugly. Will scores of families move to town and manufacturers set up shop here if we clean up our act? Not necessarily. But wouldn’t it be a pretty place to live? 

This looks much better than litter-strewn ditches.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: One piece of the solution would be to institute a nickel or dime deposit on glass, plastic and aluminum beverage containers in Illinois. Hell, do it nationwide — several states already have such policies. Consumers will be reluctant to toss cans and bottles in the gutter if they’re worth real money. And even if some jerks still pitch their half-swilled Pepsi cans and Dasani bottles out the car window, they’ll be snatched up quickly by not only the environmentally conscious, but by anyone looking to make a quick buck. Today alone I would have pocketed $3.20 (on a 10-cent deposit) instead of a mere 14 cents.

If that doesn’t work, I’ll support the lottery idea — or execution.

Today’s Trash

12 water bottles (4 partially full)

5 sports drink/juice bottles

1 glass beer bottle

14 aluminum cans