Litter on Taney and Bainbridge St.

English 9

You and the World

Philadelphia is made up of thousands of small neighborhoods. Each neighborhood is unique in its own way, however most share one similarity. Many of the streets and sidewalks in Philadelphia have litter spread along them. I live near Taney and Bainbridge Streets, and it is hard not to notice the trash that is carelessly discarded. The city of Philadelphia has trash trucks that go down our street every Monday morning.  http://www.philadelphiastreets.com/sanitation/residential/. Philadelphia Streets department has a Litter Cabinet that is supposed to reduce trash in neighborhoods http://www.philadelphiastreets.com/zero-starts-with-one/ . But I have never heard anything about them in my neighborhood before. So I think that Not In Philly is a more effective program http://notinphilly.org/. first moved into this neighborhood in the Summer of 2012. It was beautiful and clean thanks to a few of our neighbors who really cared for and supported our neighborhood. They would go out on the street almost every day and pick up the trash, keeping it a healthy place to live. After a few years of living here, some of those neighbors moved out and were soon replaced by new ones. These newcomers were not like the previous ones who left. Instead they lived an unhealthy lifestyle of smoking cigarettes and drinking. They dropped their cigarette butts out on the streets when they were done, leaving a mess behind. In addition, when they put their trash cans or bags outside for the garbage pick up, and they toppled over, they did not pick them up, or pick up the trash that had been left behind. A few years ago construction for CHOP towers began and is still going on to this day. The demolition of some of the nearby factories, the dust, and the litter of the construction workers increased the existing garbage.

During this past MLK day, my family and I went to clean up the streets with trash grabbers and trash bags that were given to us by a nonprofit organization, called Not in Philly.  Not in Philly was started by a family friend of ours, who wanted to help make Philly a better place to live.  We were some of the only ones to pick up the trash while a few neighbors just stood on their door step and watched. We also had the chance to share about Not in Philly with one of our neighbors when he asked what we were doing, and he sounded interested.

There are two reasons, in my opinion, that our neighborhood has become messier and litter filled. First, some of the newer neighbors (mostly in rental properties) do not seem to care about keeping the neighborhood clean.  Second, there is ongoing construction in three places  in our neighborhood, which leads to increased dirt and litter. Our new neighbors on both Taney and Bainbridge streets have contributed to the problem and it is getting worse. This is a negative and damaging situation happening in the community and this affects all the people in the area because it may influence the current people and the future generations in the neighborhood that it is okay to leave litter our streets. This would continue to make Taney and Bainbridge an unhealthy and non-beautiful place to live. Also, the increase in the amount of pollution on Taney and Bainbridge will increase the inhabitants chances of sickness and disease.

http://notinphilly.org/ N Not In Philly Logo

Https://southofsouth.org/sites/southofsouth.org/files/PCPC%20South%20of%20South%20Plan.p

http://www.philadelphiastreets.com/sanitation/residential/¨Sanitation¨ garbage truck: From http://www.philadelphiastreets.com/sanitation/residential/