04/30/2012 - Upper Dog River

Header image is the obligatory photo of a wood duck in Dog River with the usual trash in the background.

I kayaked in upper Dog River today to see how effective the annual week long Spring Cleanup event was. It ended on Saturday. Looks good here...from a distance. 

This couple was chill'n in front of the River Landing Condominiums on this hot summer-like day. Looks good here, but of course, the Condo grounds are maintained. Let's see what is across the river from them.

Here is Dog River Park today by the interpretive signs. The city workers who maintain this park seem to be blind to trash. That is part of the problem with Mobile being so trashy. The City tolerates trash like this in their parks and along all their roadways. We need new leadership in Mobile because the trash loving officials in there now have proven they are not capable of keeping city parks clean.

The back side of Dog River Park was littered too, including trash in the water.

A couple of shoreline properties further up along Dog River looked like they had been cleaned in a few spots. However, based on what I saw along the normally trashy shoreline areas, it was apparent that this Clean-Up event failed to remove most of the garbage that was already there. A once a year 4-hour volunteer cleanup event to remove a year's worth of trash is akin to removing a couple of turds from a toilet that has been overflowing for an entire year. A few people can walk away feeling good that they tried to make a difference by removing some crap, but, in reality, the majority of the crap is still there. It is not the fault of the volunteers that the cleanup event failed. They should be praised for their efforts. The question is, why is there so much shoreline garbage? Because Mobile has no one removing it after it enters urban waterways. Failure of the City of Mobile to plan to remove garbage once it hits their waterways is basically a City of Mobile plan to pollute your local waterways. 

I bet the water bottlers are laughing all the way to the bank about the worsening water pollution in this area. The public perception of water being polluted is good for water bottler's business. I wonder how much money the water bottlers contributed to the campaigns of the local elected officials who continue to allow public garbage to rot in local waterways, month after month, year after year...

More typical shoreline garbage in the same place as it was last year.

More typical shoreline garbage in the same place as it was last year.

No one removed the hazardous televisions from Dog River. This rerun is getting old.

No one removed the hazardous televisions from Dog River. This rerun is getting old.