Littering during running events

Trampas · 24-11-2019 2:48pm

As said already you need litter zones. At least that way vast majority would be in an area. If thousands of runners it’s hard to police as how do you stop someone in the middle of the pack where in Ironman it’s on the bike and run and more spread out.

If going down cups needs to be more water stations in races where they have them.

Murph_D · 24-11-2019 3:15pm

We will always have littering as long as individuals expect people to clean up after them, or just don’t give a sh1t. To blame the event is to miss the point. These eejits probably litter all the time, not just while racing.

strandroad · 24-11-2019 3:21pm

28064212 wrote: »

Seen this mentioned multiple times in the thread: how is it envisaged that it would work? Dedicated trash-spotting marshals? A network of cameras? The majority of races are stretched both in personnel and funds, so both of those are out. Runner reports? One runner's word against another might not go down very well, not to mention most runners who see someone throwing rubbish aren't going to be able to see the offender's number.

Spot checks are enough. If you disqualify a few and make a sufficiently big deal out of it, you'll see runners suddenly paying attention. Imagine paying the fees and perhaps travel or accommodation just to lose it and be publicly called out as a litterbug.

John_Rambo · 24-11-2019 5:53pm

28064212 wrote: »

Seen this mentioned multiple times in the thread: how is it envisaged that it would work? Dedicated trash-spotting marshals? A network of cameras?

Marshals take down the bib number of anyone littering and they're fined. If they don't pay the fine they're not allowed compete again.

Littering is unacceptable, doesn't matter what you're at. I compete on the water and stuff my wrappers down the neck of my wetsuit.

24-11-2019 6:40pm

strandroad wrote: »

Spot checks are enough. If you disqualify a few and make a sufficiently big deal out of it, you'll see runners suddenly paying attention.

"Spot checks" - again, how would these work in practice? Describe your potential checks that don't require significant personnel or financial resources.

strandroad wrote: »

Imagine paying the fees and perhaps travel or accommodation just to lose it and be publicly called out as a litterbug.

And if the runner says they didn't (or even if there's a genuine mistake)? A single defamation lawsuit, and you'll see hundreds of races across the country shutting down, as there is absolutely no way they'll get insurance to cover potential lawsuits.

John_Rambo wrote: »

Marshals take down the bib number of anyone littering and they're fined. If they don't pay the fine they're not allowed compete again.

Again, in practice, how is a marshal (who is often just a teenager in a bib) supposed to do this? A pad and pen, while also directing runners and stopping traffic? Not to mention the fact that even a dedicated "litter spotting marshal" could, at best, cover a 50m stretch of road, assuming that there aren't too many runners at once (there usually are).

John_Rambo wrote: »

Littering is unacceptable

I agree. I just disagree that there's some magic fix that race organisers can put in place

Murph_D · 24-11-2019 7:42pm

28064212 wrote: »

"Spot checks" - again, how would these work in practice? Describe your potential checks that don't require significant personnel or financial resources.
And if the runner says they didn't (or even if there's a genuine mistake)? A single defamation lawsuit, and you'll see hundreds of races across the country shutting down, as there is absolutely no way they'll get insurance to cover potential lawsuits.

Again, in practice, how is a marshal (who is often just a teenager in a bib) supposed to do this? A pad and pen, while also directing runners and stopping traffic? Not to mention the fact that even a dedicated "litter spotting marshal" could, at best, cover a 50m stretch of road, assuming that there aren't too many runners at once (there usually are).
I agree. I just disagree that there's some magic fix that race organisers can put in place

Not a magic fix, but an old fashioned one - higher taxes, spend some of the money on more education about environmental care (we need to be doing this anyway), spend a bit more on road sweeping etc. Radical, eh?

Limpy · 24-11-2019 9:29pm

If you pay good money for a big race it should be included in the price. You train hard and dont want to worry about what cup or where it goes if your trying to keep marathon pace for 26.2 miles.

The elites have there own table, considering they would have no crowds to battle with for a cup or a bin to dump it, they should lead by example.

Add x to the race price and pay people to pick them up.

robinph · 24-11-2019 9:46pm

If a race has the spare personell to have someone on the course checking for numbers, or even stick a camera up and check the video afterwards, then they could stick more bins out on the route instead and eliminate the problem that way without banning anyone.

grimbergen · 24-11-2019 10:11pm

robinph wrote: »

A lot of races could do more to help things.

Massive bins, with a big target on them so that you have something to aim at and can also see them from afar, and have those bins up to at least a km after the water station. 1km is really not that far if you go past a water station and are then negotiating your way out of a crowd, extracting a gel, consuming your gel, downing some water, putting the empty wrapper back in your pocket, trying not to trip over discarded bottles, drinking some more water... and then you find you are past the last bin as the people setting up thought 100m afterwards was a long way.

Saw this used to great effect in the Wicklow half last year. About 800m after the water stations - giant skip bags that you couldn't miss with signs on the run up saying something like "strictly no bottles after this point".

Seemed to work as in there were zero bottles to be seen after that and the rubbish if any was contained in one area.

PhilOssophy · 25-11-2019 1:39pm

grimbergen wrote: »

Saw this used to great effect in the Wicklow half last year. About 800m after the water stations - giant skip bags that you couldn't miss with signs on the run up saying something like "strictly no bottles after this point".

Seemed to work as in there were zero bottles to be seen after that and the rubbish if any was contained in one area.

I saw that in a half-marathon too, cue further down the road some einstein throwing his bottle over the ditch

pc11 · 25-11-2019 2:08pm

RacoonQueen wrote: »

But given you can't carry the cups like you can bottles, the cups would be discarded near the water station. So easier to clean up.

In Ironman events there are litter zones, if you discard anything outside the litter zones, you're penalised. Running needs to be more open to DQs for dangerous and ignorant behaviour.

This seems totally wrongheaded. Taking a sip from a cup and ditching it is practically useless for a long event like a marathon. I want to carry the small bottle for a while and take multiple sips. I'm not a dickhead, I'm not going to toss it away just anywhere.

Changing people's behaviour is the answer, not penalising the considerate runners. I hate this logic.

I agree with DQ. It's done in triathlon. As a former TI referee, I have given instructions to motorbike officials to give penalties for littering.

John_Rambo · 28-11-2019 10:42am

28064212 wrote: »

Again, in practice, how is a marshal (who is often just a teenager in a bib) supposed to do this? A pad and pen, while also directing runners and stopping traffic? Not to mention the fact that even a dedicated "litter spotting marshal" could, at best, cover a 50m stretch of road, assuming that there aren't too many runners at once (there usually are).
I agree. I just disagree that there's some magic fix that race organisers can put in place

Marshal sees a litterer, jots down the number, litterer is banned from the next race. The mere threat will stop most from littering.

robinph · 28-11-2019 11:11am

John_Rambo wrote: »

Marshal sees a litterer, jots down the number, litterer is banned from the next race. The mere threat will stop most from littering.

In a trail ultra where there is one person passing every 30 seconds then yes, and I'd expect that to already happen. Although in reality if you've carried an empty cup for the last 5 miles from the previous drink station the marshals tend to be happy to take the cups from you and would have a bin bag with them anyway.

In a mass participation road race then there is no hope of spotting the runner, spotting their number and writing it down before the next person to drop a bottle goes past you. The solution in that situation is to put a big bin there as if there are so many people dropping bottles outside of the designated bottle dropping zones then probably the designated bottle dropping zone is setup incorrectly.

Find other methods of liquid delivery for the mass participation road races, such as different types of compostable cups and ways of collecting them efficiently, not attempt to penalise runners for something that is out of their control when in a hoard of thousands of other runners.

John_Rambo · 29-11-2019 9:22pm

robinph wrote: »

In a trail ultra where there is one person passing every 30 seconds then yes, and I'd expect that to already happen. Although in reality if you've carried an empty cup for the last 5 miles from the previous drink station the marshals tend to be happy to take the cups from you and would have a bin bag with them anyway.

In a mass participation road race then there is no hope of spotting the runner, spotting their number and writing it down before the next person to drop a bottle goes past you. The solution in that situation is to put a big bin there as if there are so many people dropping bottles outside of the designated bottle dropping zones then probably the designated bottle dropping zone is setup incorrectly.

Find other methods of liquid delivery for the mass participation road races, such as different types of compostable cups and ways of collecting them efficiently, not attempt to penalise runners for something that is out of their control when in a hoard of thousands of other runners.

Good points. Maybe a camel bag and a friendly warning in the goody bag!

PhilOssophy · 30-11-2019 6:03pm

robinph wrote: »

In a trail ultra where there is one person passing every 30 seconds then yes, and I'd expect that to already happen. Although in reality if you've carried an empty cup for the last 5 miles from the previous drink station the marshals tend to be happy to take the cups from you and would have a bin bag with them anyway.

In a mass participation road race then there is no hope of spotting the runner, spotting their number and writing it down before the next person to drop a bottle goes past you. The solution in that situation is to put a big bin there as if there are so many people dropping bottles outside of the designated bottle dropping zones then probably the designated bottle dropping zone is setup incorrectly.

Find other methods of liquid delivery for the mass participation road races, such as different types of compostable cups and ways of collecting them efficiently, not attempt to penalise runners for something that is out of their control when in a hoard of thousands of other runners.

The expectation would not be that they'd get absolutely every runner who litters, but if the threat of DQ hung over you, I'd expect everybody to behave a bit more responsibly.

robinph · 30-11-2019 6:18pm

PhilOssophy wrote: »

The expectation would not be that they'd get absolutely every runner who litters, but if the threat of DQ hung over you, I'd expect everybody to behave a bit more responsibly.

What, like with the threat of DQ for wearing headphones at the moment?

For massed road races the far simpler solution is more bins, the aim being to to collect the bottles anyway.

Burkie1203 · 01-12-2019 10:25am

Had a row with a guy at 14k in clontarf half yesterday

4 lads at the entrance into the beach with bags for cleaning up race rubbish and this lad chucked his bottle about 20m into the dunes. The 4 lads were 20m in front of him.

bucketybuck · 01-12-2019 12:36pm

John_Rambo wrote: »

Marshal sees a litterer, jots down the number, litterer is banned from the next race. The mere threat will stop most from littering.

Is every volunteer along the course also a marshal? Have they all had their eyesight tested?

Will I get banned from a race because I was number 889 and race number 888 threw a bottle and was seen by a volunteer 300 yards away?

Will I get banned because I threw a bottle to my wife in the crowd as I passed and a marshal 300 yards away thought I was littering? What if the marshal just didn't like me and said I was littering? Is there a chance of appeal?

How does getting banned from the next race work? I assume a volunteer will have to cross check email addresses against a banned list and then refuse entries? How does that mesh with online entry, get the computer to verify the email? What if they just use another email address?

Who actually has to officially do the banning? The race director I assume? Who does it for headphone wearers? Do headphone wearers ever actually get banned?

I have absolutely no problem with banning egregious litterbugs, I am a little curious how this is actually supposed to work in the real world.

strandroad · 01-12-2019 1:47pm

bucketybuck wrote: »

Is every volunteer along the course also a marshal? Have they all had their eyesight tested?

Will I get banned from a race because I was number 889 and race number 888 threw a bottle and was seen by a volunteer 300 yards away?

Will I get banned because I threw a bottle to my wife in the crowd as I passed and a marshal 300 yards away thought I was littering? What if the marshal just didn't like me and said I was littering? Is there a chance of appeal?

How does getting banned from the next race work? I assume a volunteer will have to cross check email addresses against a banned list and then refuse entries? How does that mesh with online entry, get the computer to verify the email? What if they just use another email address?

Who actually has to officially do the banning? The race director I assume? Who does it for headphone wearers? Do headphone wearers ever actually get banned?

I have absolutely no problem with banning egregious litterbugs, I am a little curious how this is actually supposed to work in the real world.

It doesn't need to be complicated. You're not going to catch everyone and there is no need to. What you want is to make a well amplified example of some. Have several volunteers film the run along the route and disqualify runners filmed littering, with appropriate public announcement. Perhaps you don't even need to ban them going forward, dq should be enough of a deterrent.

01-12-2019 2:02pm

strandroad wrote: »

Have several volunteers film the run along the route and disqualify runners filmed littering

How? On their personal phones? You've now made them a data processor, subject to GDPR-related laws. How are they securing that data, how long will they retain it, what other purposes will it be used for?

Not to mention the man-hours involved in collecting and actually going through the footage. And what is it you think volunteers do that they have time to just stand there filming? Or are these extra volunteers specifically for filming, given that most races are run by a handful of people?

lawred2 · 01-12-2019 2:03pm

PhilOssophy wrote: »

Dublin was a complete mess after the Dublin marathon and still along the route, there are still bottles, energy gels, etc (where they are not covered up by leaves only to be discovered in Spring).

What should/can be done about it? I appreciate that there often isn't enough/big enough bins provided along the routes, I've also seen people throw bottles into/over ditches, etc in running events before.

Is there enough education here, i.e do people realise that sometimes you have to carry a bottle for a few minutes after you finish but you will eventually come across one?

Or should there be some form of undercover "litter warden" and if people are seen littering (you have their identity from their bib) they should be fined or something, just like littering any other day of the week?

Couldn't be expecting personal responsibility now

bucketybuck · 01-12-2019 2:11pm

strandroad wrote: »

It doesn't need to be complicated.

But it is complicated, the fact that it takes only half a second to think of a dozen simple questions and their implications demonstrates that quite clearly.

I mean, saying that somebody should film the route, then disqualify runners with a public announcement! Sure, its a nice thought, but get any part of that wrong and you could easily end up in court for GDPR breach or maybe defamation.

Its easy to throw out soundbites about what should be done, far harder to do something about it in the real world.

The Davestator · 02-12-2019 10:53am

Could do something like the time penalty in Ironman races.

If volunteer sees someone littering, they simply show them a red card and that person is then disqualified and does not get to finish the race.
Or it could be a time penalty, but that would not bother some people who are just out to finish a race.

lawred2 · 02-12-2019 2:30pm

bucketybuck wrote: »

But it is complicated, the fact that it takes only half a second to think of a dozen simple questions and their implications demonstrates that quite clearly.

I mean, saying that somebody should film the route, then disqualify runners with a public announcement! Sure, its a nice thought, but get any part of that wrong and you could easily end up in court for GDPR breach or maybe defamation.

Its easy to throw out soundbites about what should be done, far harder to do something about it in the real world.

could just tell people to stop acting like scumbags and look after their own waste.

strandroad · 02-12-2019 2:38pm

bucketybuck wrote: »

Its easy to throw out soundbites about what should be done, far harder to do something about it in the real world.

Triathlons do it and have for a while so it's clearly doable!

robinph · 02-12-2019 2:58pm

strandroad wrote: »

Triathlons do it and have for a while so it's clearly doable!

But don't you have a smaller and far more dispersed field by the time you get to the run in a triathlon (of any distance) than you would even at mile 23 of a marathon as "small" as Dublin for example.

You can have motorbike marshals spotting people drafting, or dropping gel wrappers from their bike on the way round, or even have marshals during the run spotting the runners dropping bottles outside of a designated area.
How do you do that on a road race though where the width of the entire road is taken up with runners for the entire distance? Other than setting up a load of video cameras and chip timing mats for the entire distance of the course the individual runners are not identifiable in the middle of the road in a mass participation road race.

Now you can have small races hand out warnings and DQ's where it's easy to identify people throwing stuff into fields and such like and hope that that education filters it's way into the fields in bigger road races, but if you are handing out 1 million bottles of water during the course of the likes of London Marathon then the organisers just have to accept that not every bottle is going to make it into the bins setup 50m past the end of the water station and have more bins and clean up crews organised.

As much as I'd like to be able to aim a bottle at the bin on the side of the road, it's not always possible to get the aim right whilst also running at pace, and throwing the bottle over the heads of the 50 other people between me and the bin.

PhilOssophy · 02-12-2019 5:24pm

robinph wrote: »

As much as I'd like to be able to aim a bottle at the bin on the side of the road, it's not always possible to get the aim right whilst also running at pace, and throwing the bottle over the heads of the 50 other people between me and the bin.

Excuse. Where there's a will there's a way

scoobydude · 02-12-2019 5:29pm

At the Clonakilty event over the weekend the water bottles at all the stations were biodegradable. Now I know there is a responsibility on the participants to not litter, but at least the gob****es who feel the need to fling the bottle into the adjoining hedges and fields aren't doing too much damage

average_runner · 02-12-2019 5:31pm

PhilOssophy wrote: »

Excuse. Where there's a will there's a way

Most races dont ask you to get it in a bin, they have a dumping area. That's good enough.

Sadly you will always get people who will not behave, same in all forms of life.

Stark · 02-12-2019 5:34pm

scoobydude wrote: »

At the Clonakilty event over the weekend the water bottles at all the stations were biodegradable. Now I know there is a responsibility on the participants to not litter, but at least the gob****es who feel the need to fling the bottle into the adjoining hedges and fields aren't doing too much damage

Different levels of biodegradable. Some things are marked as biodegradable, but will only break down in any sort of reasonable timeframe in an industrial composter. Most "biodegradable" plastic substitutes fall into this category.

Banana and orange peels for example, take about 2 years to biodegrade in the open air.

Littering during running events

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