cheapmeister
Jul 3rd, 2012, 11:14 PM
http://i.thestar.com/images/66/16/63e614b1409aa116e05c26cfe61a.jpg
It’s the morning after a long weekend of Pride and Canada Day celebrations, and Toronto beaches have mutated into places only Oscar the Grouch could love — sandy goldmines of trash.
Strolling down the Sunnyside boardwalk early Tuesday morning was like walking through a crime scene. Trash was everywhere you looked or stepped, evidence of thousands of litterbugs who had a great time by the shore the night before but decidedly left their garbage behind.
In addition to the usual beach rubbish of beer bottles and pizza trays, there were remnants of fireworks, toppled garbage cans, Tupperware containers of discarded food and piles of trash sitting unusually close to garbage cans that weren’t full.
“I’m appalled, I thought we were civilized people, why would you just drop your garbage?” asked Sarah Doucette, councillor for Ward 13, Parkdale-High Park.
Some strollers might pick up garbage they see along the way, shake their heads, curse under their breath and toss it into its rightful place. But picking up after Torontonians is mostly the job of city workers.
“The staff realize that it’s going to be busy, they don’t dread it because they know what they are getting into when they sign up to clean down there,” said Darrell Vossen, general supervisor for waterfront parks at Toronto Parks, Forestry and Recreation. “It’s busy, but they get satisfaction out of providing a service to the public.”
Cleanup crews got to work at around 6:30 a.m. Tuesday. And with all the celebrations over the weekend, there was a lot of work to do.
Usually, the beaches — from just west of Sunnyside Beach to Woodbine Beach — would be cleaned by 10 a.m., said Vossen. But on Tuesday, the workers were still picking up trash at 2 p.m.
So with long-armed trash pickers in hand and their beachcombing tractors running, workers spent eight hours cleaning up after others in the 31C heat.
“City staff can do what they can, but why are they picking up after the public’s garbage?” said Doucette.
She said the littering habit must change, particularly the herd mentality that results in garbage being thrown into a pile outside a trash can.
“My grandma would have gone down there with an umbrella and made people pick up after themselves,” she said. “It’s not just the mess and filth, it’s the wildlife that we also have to take into consideration.”
Littering isn’t limited to long weekends. Other festivals and events are bedevilled by it, and there’s not much the city can do.
“What are you going to do?” Doucette asked. “There are already signs that say don’t litter, don’t dump and things. And people complain that we have too many signs, do we need to spend extra time and energy to put on a campaign saying put your garbage in the bin? I thought we were beyond that.”
One solution, she said, is to make sure children learn to pick up their trash, and then they can educate their parents. “I think it’s sad people don’t take pride in their local spaces.”
http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/article/1220975--toronto-beaches-a-filthy-mess-after-the-canada-day-long-weekend
Wow so messy and sloppy! A lot of peeps are real slobs, I've seen some who won't turn off a faucet and some that throw garbage beside the can instead of in it! Why would peeps not throw the garbage in the can on purpose? Do they like to see garbage all over or something? Is messy their style?
It’s the morning after a long weekend of Pride and Canada Day celebrations, and Toronto beaches have mutated into places only Oscar the Grouch could love — sandy goldmines of trash.
Strolling down the Sunnyside boardwalk early Tuesday morning was like walking through a crime scene. Trash was everywhere you looked or stepped, evidence of thousands of litterbugs who had a great time by the shore the night before but decidedly left their garbage behind.
In addition to the usual beach rubbish of beer bottles and pizza trays, there were remnants of fireworks, toppled garbage cans, Tupperware containers of discarded food and piles of trash sitting unusually close to garbage cans that weren’t full.
“I’m appalled, I thought we were civilized people, why would you just drop your garbage?” asked Sarah Doucette, councillor for Ward 13, Parkdale-High Park.
Some strollers might pick up garbage they see along the way, shake their heads, curse under their breath and toss it into its rightful place. But picking up after Torontonians is mostly the job of city workers.
“The staff realize that it’s going to be busy, they don’t dread it because they know what they are getting into when they sign up to clean down there,” said Darrell Vossen, general supervisor for waterfront parks at Toronto Parks, Forestry and Recreation. “It’s busy, but they get satisfaction out of providing a service to the public.”
Cleanup crews got to work at around 6:30 a.m. Tuesday. And with all the celebrations over the weekend, there was a lot of work to do.
Usually, the beaches — from just west of Sunnyside Beach to Woodbine Beach — would be cleaned by 10 a.m., said Vossen. But on Tuesday, the workers were still picking up trash at 2 p.m.
So with long-armed trash pickers in hand and their beachcombing tractors running, workers spent eight hours cleaning up after others in the 31C heat.
“City staff can do what they can, but why are they picking up after the public’s garbage?” said Doucette.
She said the littering habit must change, particularly the herd mentality that results in garbage being thrown into a pile outside a trash can.
“My grandma would have gone down there with an umbrella and made people pick up after themselves,” she said. “It’s not just the mess and filth, it’s the wildlife that we also have to take into consideration.”
Littering isn’t limited to long weekends. Other festivals and events are bedevilled by it, and there’s not much the city can do.
“What are you going to do?” Doucette asked. “There are already signs that say don’t litter, don’t dump and things. And people complain that we have too many signs, do we need to spend extra time and energy to put on a campaign saying put your garbage in the bin? I thought we were beyond that.”
One solution, she said, is to make sure children learn to pick up their trash, and then they can educate their parents. “I think it’s sad people don’t take pride in their local spaces.”
http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/article/1220975--toronto-beaches-a-filthy-mess-after-the-canada-day-long-weekend
Wow so messy and sloppy! A lot of peeps are real slobs, I've seen some who won't turn off a faucet and some that throw garbage beside the can instead of in it! Why would peeps not throw the garbage in the can on purpose? Do they like to see garbage all over or something? Is messy their style?