Trash Talk: Birmingham’s Litter Problem
Christopher Burts shakes open a trash bag as a litter patrol begins pickup along I-459. He’s the litter patrol supervisor for Sweeping Corporation of America. That’s an Ohio-based private company contracted by the Alabama Department of Transportation. The company’s job is to clear highways of trash and debris.
Burts oversees a cleanup crew of six people, and he says the trashiest part of his route is between Birmingham and Fairfield.
“It’s a lot of trash out here,” Burts says. “Cans, bottles, and cardboard boxes. You got items from 18-wheelers that’s flying off, we have to pick that up,” he says.
William “Dee” McDaniel, ALDOT’s operations engineer for the Birmingham region, says the crews cover a lot of ground — nearly 18 miles a day. But it feels like their work is never done.
“I’ve seen several instances where within 24 hours we go back out there and it looks like we haven’t picked anything up,” McDaniel says.
“So picking up litter, unfortunately, will be a never-ending process for us. That’s just one of the things we have to budget for and schedule on a regular basis.”
McDaniel says ALDOT spends $1.9 million a year on litter pick-up across the Birmingham region. He says of all the cities in that area, Birmingham is the trashiest.
In a recent meeting, some city council members accused Mayor Randall Woodfin of not doing enough to keep the city clean. But Woodfin says residents have to do their part.
“You got a whole bunch of folk who instead of holding things in their car, they just throw it outside their window,” he says. “We don’t have a problem enforcing but we got a problem with folk who don’t wanna take care of their own place,” Woodfin says.
Councilman Steven Hoyt says Birmingham’s public works department, which oversees sanitation, is understaffed. Hoyt says the city is filthy, and he blames the mayor.
“The mayor has the sole responsibility of keeping this city clean. It’s his responsibility. If he has initiatives that he thinks would work, he wouldn’t have a problem with the council supporting those initiatives,” Hoyt says.
Birmingham has an ordinance that imposes fines on people who litter, but Hoyt says no one is enforcing the law.
McDaniel hopes a solution is in place soon. It’s a busy time of year for trash.
“As spring and summer months get here and more people are on the road of course traveling through and so forth, obviously we have an increase in litter that we usually have to pick up,” he says.
Burts, who supervises the highway litter patrol, says drivers will throw almost anything out of the window — even dirty diapers. But he says that’s not the nastiest thing the patrol picks up.
“The lil bottles that sit on the side, they might have pee in it,” Burts says. “And you don’t know until you go to sticking it and put it in a bag and you’ll be walking like …” what is that smell, he says.
It’s times like this he remembers being a kid, and his mother would tell him “quit throwing stuff out the window” because you never know who has to pick it up.
This nation has the fastest rising rate of cancer cases — and deaths — in the world
According to a new report, cancer rates are skyrocketing in this tiny country. What's causing this to happen? And what steps can be taken to turn the tide?
Iceland reports the presence of mosquitoes for the first time, as climate warms
The discovery of three Culiseta annulata mosquitoes was confirmed this week by the Natural Science Institute of Iceland, which said the mosquitoes likely arrived by freight.
Alabama board seeks to ban books that ‘positively’ depict trans themes from library youth sections
The Alabama Public Library Service Board of Directors is considering a proposed rule change that expands the existing requirement for youth sections to be free of “material deemed inappropriate for children.” The new proposal said that includes any material that “positively depicts transgender procedures, gender ideology, or the concept of more than two biological genders.”
After months of the same songs on the Hot 100, ‘Billboard’ tweaks its rules
Billboard has revised its system of removing songs from the Hot 100 singles chart once they've gotten too old to qualify as contemporary hits.
Greetings from an Indian Railways coach, with spectacular views from Mumbai to Goa
Far-Flung Postcards is a weekly series in which NPR's international team shares moments from their lives and work around the world.
Alabama inmate asks to meet with governor ahead of execution
Anthony Boyd is scheduled to be executed Thursday evening by nitrogen gas at the William C. Holman Correctional Facility. A jury convicted Boyd of capital murder for the 1993 burning death of Gregory Huguley in Talladega County.