SPOILING BEAUTY SPOTS

Dominion, Volume 19, Issue 94, 15 January 1926, Page 6

SPOILING BEAUTY SPOTS

MOTORISTS’ LITTER AND RUBBISH

There is no getting away from the fact that large numbers of persons of dirty and untidy habits are now in possession of motor-cars, and are travelling about the countryside on pleasure bent leaving a trail of jam tins, paper, and rubbish wherever they' halt and recklessly breaking down vegetation.

All over the country, county councils are complaining also ot motorists throwing empty tins into the ditches and creeks, thus interfering with the proper drainage of the roads, and blocking culverts. A recent traveller by car who camped near the Aratiatia Rapids on the Waikato River says that what should be an exceedingly beautiful and pleasant spot for camping is rapidly becoming just a litter of rubbish of all sorts, and the vegetation is also being smashed up. The Huka Falls, a few miles away, arc now surrounded by similar unsightly litter. Elsewhere on the road the same thing is found to a greater or smaller extent at nearly every attractive halting place. It is high time that every, decentminded motorist developed a rigid conscience in the matter ot cleaning up after a halt. With 120,000 motor vehicles of one sort and another on the roads in the Dominion, tlie idea that a little rubbish left behind scattered over the grass doesn’t matter is an idea that has to be completely eradicated. No selfrespecting motorist should leave any litter promiscuously behind at any halt-ing-place. Everything that can be burnt should be burnt, and what cannot be burnt should be buried. In America they are reaching the point where it is becoming regarded as real . motoring etiquette to carry one’s rubbish back home again and dump it in the family rubbish tin. On one-dav outings to much-fre-quented spots this is undoubtedly the best and most considerate method of disposing of empty tins, and other matter that'cannot be burnt. Elsewhere on this page will be found set out "The Creed of the Open Road, as compiled by the American Automobile Association, and the principles therein set out should be observed by all who desire to see the natural beauty and freshness of the countryside preserved.