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C&RT State Removing Litter Bins Reduces Rubbish


Alan de Enfield

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From Narrowboat World - can this be true ?

 

THE latest crazy scheme from Canal & River Trust is a national plan to reduce its waterside litter bins in order to reduce litter!

At a recent meeting between Canal & River Trust and the National Bargee Travellers Association London Branch, the Trust stated that it has a national plan to remove 40% of litter bins from the towpaths in order to reduce litter.

Keep them in storage

It plans to keep them in storage and only reinstate them if litter continues to be a problem.

Sam Thomas, Canal & River Trust London Customer Operations Manager, told that 'there is equal evidence for and against having less bins', though he was not able to share this evidence, but when replying to the  anti-litter campaign group Keep Britain Tidy, he blamed the 'mistreatment' of bins as a reason to remove them, telling the meeting:

"In London, a number of litter bins along the towpath were being mistreated and were being used by people to fly tip. This means the bins in question were overflowing. People walking along the towpath will have to carry their litter a little further to put it in a bin, or maybe even take it home.”

Already removing bins

However, the plan to remove 40% of litter bins is a national policy, not just a London policy. It’s strange to argue that the 'mistreatment' of litter bins in London is a good reason to take away bins nationally. Yet, CaRT has already started removing litter bins.

Two bins were removed in Cheshunt on the Lee Navigation, one of which was next to the permanent ice cream boat. Another bin has been taken from a busy picnic area in Hackney on the Regents Canal, with a spokesman from Keep Britain Tidy rightly called the move by CaRT 'concerning'.

No shortage of litter

A spokesman for the National Bargee Travellers Association complained:

"It is already a struggle to find litter bins on the towpath, particularly in West London, yet there’s never a  shortage of litter. So it would be interesting to see what evidence CaRT has to support their view that less bins equals less litter.

"Many have suggested that emptying the bins more often would solve any 'overflowing' issues, yet when questioned about the frequency at which bins are emptied, CaRT’s vague response stated 'some daily, some weekly, some depend on season'. This is simply not good enough—perhaps they should have a clear policy on emptying bins before they start removing them.

Thought they were joking

Marcus Trower, the Deputy Chairman of the National Bargee Travellers Association exclaimed:

“When CaRT told us about their plans to take away 40% of bins to reduce litter, I thought they were joking. Then to store them and put them back if it doesn't work, sounds like a kind of dance routine with bins:

You put the bins in,

You take the bins out,

Store them for a bit,

And then put them back again."

"This plan must be in CaRT's top 10 list of bad ideas. Think about the money that will be spent on this dead-end plan. If the public have nowhere to put their litter, it will be thrown on the ground, get into the water and end up around our propellers. I hope CaRT has a serious rethink.”

I can fully agree with the notion that, for example, the 'Ice-Cream Boat' should provide its own rubbish collection & removal - but where is the rubbish from the 600,000,000 canal visitors supposed to go ?

Edited by Alan de Enfield
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Clearly C&RT are fed up clearing the excess rubbish caused by illegal CMs dumping bags that are bigger than the litter bins they provide.

There is a difference between litter and a week's household rubbish. 

As for a Travellers' Association that has no interest in travelling, well, PLEASE?!

  • Greenie 3
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That's what I took from it too.

The issue being caused by some boaters dumping their rubbish in/around the litter bins rather than at the proper boater facilities with the type of bins more suited to deal with larger volumes of rubbish.

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52 minutes ago, zenataomm said:

Clearly C&RT are fed up clearing the excess rubbish caused by illegal CMs dumping bags that are bigger than the litter bins they provide.

 

As opposed to the countless bags of rubbish that boaters of all kinds chuck onto the towpath rather than take to a rubbish point, you mean?

Over the years I have seen this done by hirers and private boaters on boats both shiny and scruffy (I would have checked their legal status but couldn't be arsed). 

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"Please take your litter home" can be seen on signs all over the place. Can't remember which outdoor organisations have done it, National Trust, Forestry Commission, maybe? but there is this argument that providing litter bins only leads to more littering.

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Here are a couple of photos I have taken. The first is the Gt Ouse where there is no rubbish disposal for boaters but a large visitor mooring the other is Weedon where people seam to think a dog poo bin is the place to leave rubbish

DSCF9271small.jpg

DSCF5049small.jpg

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48 minutes ago, BruceinSanity said:

"Please take your litter home" can be seen on signs all over the place. Can't remember which outdoor organisations have done it, National Trust, Forestry Commission, maybe? but there is this argument that providing litter bins only leads to more littering.

Very true - during my brief period as a Town Centre Manager we had quite a good look at this

Litter bins are really needed where the litter is generated, people away from their cars or similar, go into a shop, by a drink or a sandwich, consume it, need to get rid of the packaging: they may not even have arrived by car and may be a long walk or a bus ride from home NOT having a litter bin near, for example, a chip shop, is asking for littering to occur

Miles from the nearest shop the consumer brought the packaging with them, they can take it away again.

Bins cause litter problems for two, related reasons - they need to be emptied regularly (Mendip's contract specifies they should never be more than 75% full) and if they are not, they overflow - people dump litter next to the bin. Litter bins in remote places are more expensive to empty, therefore more likely to be overloaded. Second, a bin in the open countryside undermines the culture of taking your litter away with you.  

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55 minutes ago, BruceinSanity said:

"Please take your litter home" can be seen on signs all over the place. Can't remember which outdoor organisations have done it, National Trust, Forestry Commission, maybe? but there is this argument that providing litter bins only leads to more littering.

The National Parks did it not to reduce littering but to save the tens of thousands of pounds it costs them to have the bins emptied and the rubbish disposed of.

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4 hours ago, Alan de Enfield said:

From Narrowboat World - can this be true ?

 

THE latest crazy scheme from Canal & River Trust is a national plan to reduce its waterside litter bins in order to reduce litter!

At a recent meeting between Canal & River Trust and the National Bargee Travellers Association London Branch, the Trust stated that it has a national plan to remove 40% of litter bins from the towpaths in order to reduce litter.

Keep them in storage

It plans to keep them in storage and only reinstate them if litter continues to be a problem.

Sam Thomas, Canal & River Trust London Customer Operations Manager, told that 'there is equal evidence for and against having less bins', though he was not able to share this evidence, but when replying to the  anti-litter campaign group Keep Britain Tidy, he blamed the 'mistreatment' of bins as a reason to remove them, telling the meeting:

"In London, a number of litter bins along the towpath were being mistreated and were being used by people to fly tip. This means the bins in question were overflowing. People walking along the towpath will have to carry their litter a little further to put it in a bin, or maybe even take it home.”

Already removing bins

However, the plan to remove 40% of litter bins is a national policy, not just a London policy. It’s strange to argue that the 'mistreatment' of litter bins in London is a good reason to take away bins nationally. Yet, CaRT has already started removing litter bins.

Two bins were removed in Cheshunt on the Lee Navigation, one of which was next to the permanent ice cream boat. Another bin has been taken from a busy picnic area in Hackney on the Regents Canal, with a spokesman from Keep Britain Tidy rightly called the move by CaRT 'concerning'.

No shortage of litter

A spokesman for the National Bargee Travellers Association complained:

"It is already a struggle to find litter bins on the towpath, particularly in West London, yet there’s never a  shortage of litter. So it would be interesting to see what evidence CaRT has to support their view that less bins equals less litter.

"Many have suggested that emptying the bins more often would solve any 'overflowing' issues, yet when questioned about the frequency at which bins are emptied, CaRT’s vague response stated 'some daily, some weekly, some depend on season'. This is simply not good enough—perhaps they should have a clear policy on emptying bins before they start removing them.

Thought they were joking

Marcus Trower, the Deputy Chairman of the National Bargee Travellers Association exclaimed:

“When CaRT told us about their plans to take away 40% of bins to reduce litter, I thought they were joking. Then to store them and put them back if it doesn't work, sounds like a kind of dance routine with bins:

You put the bins in,

You take the bins out,

Store them for a bit,

And then put them back again."

"This plan must be in CaRT's top 10 list of bad ideas. Think about the money that will be spent on this dead-end plan. If the public have nowhere to put their litter, it will be thrown on the ground, get into the water and end up around our propellers. I hope CaRT has a serious rethink.”

I can fully agree with the notion that, for example, the 'Ice-Cream Boat' should provide its own rubbish collection & removal - but where is the rubbish from the 600,000,000 canal visitors supposed to go ?

It sounds crazy, but I believe that studies have shown it to be accurate.

When it comes to litter, we can split the world into 3 types of people;

  • Will keep hold of their litter unless there is a bin that isn't full to overflowing where they can deposit it properly
  • Will keep hold of rubbish until they find a bin. If the bin is full, they consider that depositing rubbish next to the bin is fair enough
  • What's a bin?

Now the thing is that the last group will litter if you put bins every 10 feet along the towpath. The first group won't litter come what may.

The middle group don't consider themselves to be a problem. They aren't dropping litter. They are putting it in the proper place for litter, a place where it will be collected. They don't understand that a great deal of the rubbish that is not IN the bin is going to end up dispersed just as if they had dropped it all over the place.

So, unless you can absolutely guarantee that a bin you place is;

  • Large enough to accommodate all the rubbish that you indended it for, and all the rubbish that you didn't intend it to be used for
  • going to be emptied sufficiently frequently

it will increase the litter problem.

 

  • Greenie 1
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37 minutes ago, carlt said:

The National Parks did it not to reduce littering but to save the tens of thousands of pounds it costs them to have the bins emptied and the rubbish disposed of.

Don't you think C&RT also have that reason on their agenda, as well as making life yet more difficult for CMs?

Edited by zenataomm
to add "?"
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9 minutes ago, Midnight said:

The answer is to empty more bins more often but that costs and no doubt the moaners would have a field day.

Not only does it costs but with bins in rural places the demand is very variable - it is in towns too but more predictably so, and with, say, 30 bins in a town centre and 60 all within a mile of the centre it doesn't matter if the collection team find some are almost empty, on average the amount of rubbish in total will even out and there is no saving in missing bins out so they all get checked

Turn that into a bin every two miles down the towpath and it's a lot of money emptying bins that aren't full. 

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39 minutes ago, carlt said:

The National Parks did it not to reduce littering but to save the tens of thousands of pounds it costs them to have the bins emptied and the rubbish disposed of.

Yes - we have to pay Biffa £15 per week, per Bin for bin rental and 20p + VAT per Kg of rubbish.

The bin lorry has built in load cells and is (allegedly) accurate to 1kg.

Rubbish disposal is an expensive business these days - made worse so by the 'land-fill' tax.

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4 minutes ago, zenataomm said:

Don't you think C&RT also have that reason on their agenda, as well as making life yet more difficult for CMs?

I would have hoped that that was the prime motivator  rather than making life difficult for anyone.

I think litter piled up at bins that are not emptied often enough is preferable to the bags randomly chucked on the towpath or in the cut.

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7 minutes ago, zenataomm said:

Don't you think C&RT also have that reason on their agenda, as well as making life yet more difficult for CMs?

perhaps the CMers should pay more.

tin hat on and hiding under the table!

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What about the local residents who chuck rubbish over the fences for boater's rubbish bins and also pile up rubbish by full bins, shouldn't they pay as well?

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Moored at Barlaston the night before last. There are numerous, albeit small, bins around the canal side pub car park. Walking across the bridge to the shop, I passed at least four. 

There were also half a dozen bin bags full of assorted rubbish left stacked against the wall of the pub car park. I really can't see how they could have been left by anyone other than boaters. Would the bags have been left if there hadn't been bins nearby?

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2 hours ago, Iain_S said:

 

There were also half a dozen bin bags full of assorted rubbish left stacked against the wall of the pub car park. I really can't see how they could have been left by anyone other than boaters. Would the bags have been left if there hadn't been bins nearby?

There were half a dozen bin bags left by most bridges on the Walsall Canal on our BCN dredge a fee weeks ago, no sensible boaters use the Walsall other than the BCN cruises or challenge ...so you are saying certain boaters have stockpiled these????

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13 minutes ago, matty40s said:

There were half a dozen bin bags left by most bridges on the Walsall Canal on our BCN dredge a fee weeks ago, no sensible boaters use the Walsall other than the BCN cruises or challenge .

Clearly then we are not sensible boaters, having recently used it when not involved in  any BCNS event! (And no, none of the rubbish was ours!(

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A bin by a trading boat surely responsible trader should have a bin for customers.

I fully agree with no CRT litter bins.

if CRT are doing towpaths for all ! Then provision of bins and emptying should be put in place at expense shared between CRT Sustrans Angling and local councils. 

Take the litter home.

Boaters rubbish should be taken to secure areas containing the large bins and be designed so locals cannot throw rubbish over the top.

Dog poo bins are they not usually provided by the local councils ?

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20 minutes ago, roland elsdon said:

Leave the excess packaging with the supermarket ... That is the main cause of excess garbage

I often do a variant on this - clean the car rubbish out whilst at Sainsbury - most of it originated there anyway, and if they get the odd chip paper or Tesco sandwich wrapper it makes up for the stuff I end up disposing of elsewhere....

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