AFTER a recent short visit to the north-eastern states of the US, I think there’s one very good improvement to our quality of life that we should adopt from them.
I travelled approx 2200 miles – most of these on very busy roads. The one great thing that I didn’t see very much off at all was litter!!
These states have penalties ranging from $25 to $2000 for anyone casting litter onto the roadside. Even when in the vicinity of some well-known fast food outlets, their roads were mainly clear of litter. The same cannot be said of streets and roads close to these outlets in Scotland.
I don’t know how often these penalties are enforced, but something causes people to respect US roadsides. Maybe it’s simply just pride.
Separately I was informed that in more southern states prison inmates are used to clean up general areas used by the public. Sounds OK to me.
Scotland is beautiful – litter is a plague. Why not invoke the US scale of fines?? It seems to help.
Dougie Gray
Dunbar
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