Council, Residents & Businesses Team Up on Behaviour Change Project : Trash Talk Campaign to Clean Up Litter in Central Manchester, UK
In Manchester UK’s city centre residents, shopkeepers and business owners in Oxford Road and Oxford Street have today joined forces with the City Council to tackle some of the worst littering in the area.
The council, traders and residents have rallied together in the Trash Talk Oxford Street anti-litter campaign which launched with a behaviour change project, My Street is Your Street.
The campaign features a series of large posters in shop windows and on railings depicting local people and encouraging others to take pride in their high street, which are being displayed on Oxford Road and Oxford Street - with local businesses and residents remaining closely involved as the campaign progresses.
‘Ballot Bin’ ashtrays asking people to vote with their cigarette butts on questions displayed on the bin are also being deployed in a bid to encourage smokers to discard their butts in an ashtray rather than on the floor.
The Trash Talk campaign has been developed by behavior change charity which explores innovative ways to interest people in important sustainability issues and has been made possible by a collaboration of wide ranging companies.
According to Hubbub its recent research showed that people do not feel in a position to confront litter offenders - 57% said that they would be afraid to confront people who drop litter, while 45% say that they often end up clearing up other people’s litter.
Other results from the survey showed that 81% of people in the north west say that seeing litter on the streets in their local area makes them feel angry and frustrated.
The Trash Talk anti-litter campaign will run from June until October 2016. It was previously trialled was trialed in a street in London last year and reduced littering by 26%.
Chilango Borja Monasterio, general manager of local restaurant commented: “We all loathe litter but that’s not the only reason we want to stop this blight. Litter is bad for business but it’s really hard to stop people from doing it and quite frankly I don’t feel safe enough and don’t have the time to tell people to pick up their junk when they have just thrown it onto my doorstep.”
Trewin Restorick, Hubbub’s founder and CEO, said: “The My Street is Your Street campaign will test innovative ways to prevent litter, trying new interventions for the first time in Manchester. We will introduce new ideas and best practice from around the world and we’re delighted to have brought
together this unique collaboration of organisations to tackle this important issue.”
Every year, it costs Manchester City Council £7.5 million to deal with litter, fly-tipping and street cleansing, which equates to £14 per person.
Nigel Murphy, Manchester City Council's executive member for neighbourhoods added: "Littering is a very serious issue for all major cities and we dedicate considerable resources to tackling the problem. We know that city centre businesses share our desire to do even more and we're confident that this new partnership will result in real change, using innovative ways of focusing city centre visitors' attention on the impacts of littering."
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