MOVES TO PREVENT ROADSIDE DUMPING

Press, Volume C, Issue 29524, 27 May 1961, Page 14

MOVES TO PREVENT ROADSIDE DUMPING

In an endeavour to prevent indiscriminate dumping of ri**ish on roadsides and advise the public where rubbish pits are situated, a meeting of representatives of local authorities in Christchurch called by the Paparua County Council yesterday decided to spend £lO5 on advertising and publicity and to erect uniform signs at the trouble spots. After hearing proposals from the Canterbury Public Relations Officer (Mr E. G. Beckett) that his office be asked to negotiate wfith the Canterbury Junior Chamber of Commerce with a view to its taking an active part in an anti-litter campaign, the meeting decided that its efforts should be concentrated on roadside dumping of rubbish rather than litter on streets in buiit-up areas. Outlining his proposals to the meeting. Mr Beckett said that £lO6 was rather restrictive for the campaign. He suggested one type of sign of baked enamel to be erected in the trouble areas and a second type at legal dumping pits indicating the hours in which rubbish disposal is permitted. There was also the possibility of having two or three days each year set aside for special rubbish collections. "I feel any campaign has to be educational. We will not achieve anything if we just have a dpan-up in one or ■ two suburbs on certain days and leave it at that," said Mr Beckett.

Handling Difficulty His experience was that when his county had held a special clean-up week it had taken the staff and trucks all their time to handle it, said the Paparua County Engineer (Mr A. Dyhrberg).

"What it would be like in the city trying to handle all the rubbish I don’t know." The City Engineer (Mr E. Somers) said that extra collections were already being made in the city on a charge basis. Any surplus rubbish which could be taken to the gate of a property would be removed. "We tried having a special rubbish collection about 20 years ago, and it had almost the whole council staff tied up for a week.” Mr Somers said the city was naturally more interested in the anti-litter aspect than anti-dumping, but he agreed that the immediate problem was to stop the dumping of rubbish on the sides of roads outside the city.

Mr Dyhrberg said he considered that the publicity being given the campaign was already discouraging the public from dumping indiscriminately. “The general impression among city dwellers has apparently been that shingle pits are there for the sole purpose of dumping rubbish. We find trailer loads of magazines and old shoes and other rubbish which could easily be taken by the ordinary collection. Then we find old car bodies —some people seem to think the roadside is thp place for them.” The meeting then passed the motion that it should con-

centrate on the dumpmiof rubbish on roadsides and that each local authority ahould supply and erect its own signs. These signs, however, will be of a uniform design decided upon at a further meeting of representatives of the local authorities concerned. Representative* at yesterday's meeting favoured a pictorial type of sign, such as a trader full of rubbish and with a red cross indicating no dumping. The councils concerned anil be asked to submit suitable designs.