Shoreline upstream of the Stormwater Systems Bandalong litter trap remains polluted with trash.
Trashy shoreline downstream of the litter trap.
Trashy shoreline downstream of the litter trap.
Trashy shoreline downstream of the litter trap.
Any community considering the purchase of a hugely expensive Stormwater System's Bandalong Litter Trap should NOT waste money on it. At least not if the waterway is in the tidal zone.
Despite a $660,000 Bandalong litter trap installation in Eslava Creek, the creek remains polluted with trash both upstream and downstream.
Expecting a single litter trap to result in a cleaner watershed with many tributaries is like putting a large dust pan in one place along a Mardi Gras parade route and expecting it to corral the parade trash for easy removal. Sure, a large dust pan will catch a few pieces Mardi Gras trash but the remainder of the parade route will remain trashy unless laborers pick up the rest of the trash not caught in the dust pan.
The reality from the perspective of my kayak is, if a community wants clean waterways it will take manual labor working on the water from an appropriate boat and on the shorelines on foot to remove the litter chunking community's storm water trash from where it ends up in each navigable waterway after rains.
To me it seems the Stormwater Systems Bandalong Litter Trap is a burden to the City of Mobile because to remove a few pounds (bags) of lightweight plastic bottles and styrofoam trash after a heavy rain seems to require removing tons of leaves, pine straw, twigs, and grass too. Then those tons of wet natural debris have to be hauled away.
Mobile's $660,000 would have yielded better results by employing a Clean Up Boat trash picker upper person for 15 years.
Look no further than the Charles River in Boston to see a Clean Up Boat operation that has been successfully keeping the Charles River clean for over a decade at almost no cost to the City if Boston.
Local environmental groups and the City of Mobile were told about the successful Charles River Clean Up Boat operation over 5 years ago and all turned down a opportunity to mimic the waterway cleanup in Mobile's trashy waterways.
Nooo, some environmental group leader was bent on getting a litter trap instead of helping to get a Clean Up Boat in operation. She got her wish and Eslava Creek and Dog River are still lined with a sickening amount of trash because apparently the City and Community as a whole still employ ZERO full time trash picker uppers to clean the community's trash polluted waterways. That is retarded.
Trashy shoreline of Dog River downstream of the Bandalong Litter Trap.
Contrary to the popular notion that all storm water trash is benign, storm water trash includes trash hazardous to the environment and public health, like electronics and chemicals.
Not only have environmental agencies, groups and the Government failed Flint Michigan, they are failing to care about Alabama waterways too. That is pathetic.
Got Cancer Yet?
The City of Mobile does have a litter boat that was purchased in 2015; it has been used along with a smaller jon boat in shallower waters to pick up trash. Nevertheless, the trash people throw out or leave around dumpsters and garbage containers just to get into the waterways is sickening, I agree with you there...
ReplyDeleteIf the City of Mobile has two litter boats, neither one of them has completed a single cleanup route around Eslava Creek or upper Dog River. I have been monitoring the same easy to see trash pollution for YEARS.
ReplyDeleteAs I said, purchased in 2015 and it was late in 2015. Something should have happened long, long before, but it's a start! Maybe someone (anyone, not pointing the finger at you) needs to point that trash out to the litter boat operators?
ReplyDeleteIf the Litter Removal Boat (LRB) moved along the shoreline where MS4 trash tends to accumulate there is no way the worker(s) can miss seeing the MS4 trash zones.
DeleteFor what it is worth, I gave a map to the Dog River Clearwater Revival group showing where the denser concentrations of MS4 trash accumulate in upper Dog River.
I also chatted briefly with a boat operator supposedly contracted out by the City of Mobile to remove the shoreline trash in upper Dog River and pointed out a trashy shoreline commenting that it may take them a month to remove the all the trash from that 100 yard long shoreline. The shoreline was never cleaned.