Important:   Litter can be contaminated, so we have put together some information to help you handle it safely. Please click on this link to have a read through our Health and Safety Guidance before you go out litter-picking.

 

572 bags for June, July and August 2013 totals

20 Springfield,Thringstone,Coalville,LE67 8LT

31 Aug 2013

23:00

Daily litter picking In June, July and August just 3 people from Friends of Thringstone have collected and removed a staggering 572 bags of litter from the village, recycling as much as possible at the same time. .

upcoming Events

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past Events

The Big Clean with local Co-op

Litter picking as part of the Co-op's Big Clean in local woodland. Interesting litter pick with people who have never picked up litter before, and in a setting with uneven surfaces which caused health...

Community Litterpick

Meet at 10am on The Green and help us keep the village looking tidy and clear. All welcome. Litter sticks etc. provided. Free chips to all children who come along, thanks to Ruby's Fish and Chip Sh...

Clean For The Queen

Start at 10am from The Green and join us in a community litter pick. Children welcome - all children will be treated to free chips thanks to Ruby's chip shop after the litter pick finishes at 12.15pm...

Community litter pick

Meet at 10am on The Green and come litter picking with us. Whilst we endeavour to litter pick regularly in the week, there are areas we don't have time to cover. This is the chance to deal with thos...

Community litter pick

Meet at 10am on The Green and help us keep the village looking nice and clear of litter and debris. All welcome. Sticks, gloves and bags provided. 14 of us went round litter picking today and did ve...

Community Litter Pick

Meet at 10am on The Green, Thringstone and help us keep the village clear of litter and rubbish. All welcome. Equipment provided. Thanks to 1188 Air Cadet Squadron for sending out 9 cadets and 2 sta...

Clean up morning

Meet at 10am at The Green, Thringstone and help us clear the village and surrounding woodland of litter and rubbish. Bags, sticks etc. provided. All welcome. Thanks a lot to Whitwick Scouts and vari...

Community Litter Pick

Meet at The Green at 10am and come litter picking around the village and surrounding woodlands. All equipment provided. Will finish by 12.30pm We got 7 adults and one young lady who loved litter pi...

Community Litterpick

Meet at The Green, Thringstone at 10am on Saturday 29th June and help us remove unwanted litter and rubish from our village. All welcome. Litter sticks, bags etc. provided. 12 bags picked up by 7 pe...

Village Litter Pick for Climate Change Week

Meet on the car park on The Green, Thringstone at 10am and take a walk around the village and pick up litter as you go. This event is part of Climate Change Week

Village litter pick with Geocache network

Meet at 10am on The Bull's Head car park, Thringstone (just off the A512) and help members of Friends of Thringstone and the geocache network clear up the area of unsightly litter and mess. All welcom...

Don't Muck Around Campaign

Meet at 10am on The Green and help NWLDC achieve a good response from local groups around the district clearing up litter to show the district in a better light. Three of us did a litter pick for 2 h...

Envirmental clear up on CSV Action Earth day

Meet at Thringstone Green on 27th October 2012 at 10am and help keep the village clear of litter. We collected 11 bags of rubbish, and attracted a new family (and their dog) to our litter picks. The...

Environmental Clean Up Morning

Sunday 10th June 2012 at 10am from The Green.

Spring Clean For The Queen

Help clean up the village in preparation for the Jubilee celebrations. Meet at 1pm on The Green, Thringstone. All welcome.

Big Litter Pick

Meet at 10am on The Green, Thringstone, and come with us to tidy up the village of litter and discarded rubbish. All welcome. Litter pick sticks, hi viz vests and bag provided. We might even run to...

Village Litter Pick for Climate Change Week

Meet at 10am on The Green, Thringstone, and take a walk around the village and pick up litter whilst you go. This event is linked to Climate Change Week.

Environmental Clean Up Day

Meet at The Green, Thringstone at 10am and help us clear up the village and surrounding woodland.

Environmental clean up day

As part of CSV Make A Difference Day - meet at The Green, Thringstone at 10am and help us clear up the village and surrounding woodland. Anybody who comes along will get free chips at 1pm, if you wan...

Environmental Clean Up day

Meet at The Green, Thringstone at 10am and help us clear up the village and surrounding woodland.

Nearby Groups

These groups are near to you in case you want to contact them for advice, to offer them support or, for example, to share equipment with them.

Cromford Canal & Codnor Park Reservoir Group
A group of friendly, knowledgable volunteers who work under the guidance of The Derbyshire Wildlife Trust. Restoration, Education and Conservation of a local stretch of The Cromford Canal around Ironville and Jacksdale in an area of important industrial heritage with an emphasis on the protection of wildlife.
100
8 years
View
Weeley Wombleys
We started as Weeley Wombleys in 2017 as so many residents had expressed their concerns about the amount of litter appearing everywhere, and we are now part of Weeley in Bloom. There are several take-aways in the area, and the detritus was mounting up so much Tendring District Council couldn\'t keep on top of it. We litter pick on the first Monday morning of the month, and there is usually a hard-core of about 15 residents who pick regularly. We also encourage residents to keep their frontages as clear of rubbish as possible and the area has seemed a lot tidier since we started. We have been into the local School wearing our home-made WeeleyWombley costumes, together with McDonalds (our Corporate partner), to encourage the primary school children to litter pick, and to take their litter home with them. McDonalds also very kindly have a member of staff litter picking around the Village practically every day, which is very much appreciated.
1384
7 years
View
Cleaner, Greener Brighton and Hove
To create a community keen to contribute to keep our parks clear of rubbish. To encourage people to take responsibility for litter regardless of how it go there. To create a local voice for protecting and improving our environment.
0
7 years
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Greater Brislington Together
Greater Brislington Together … is a small but official organisation, formed to help Brislington community groups and volunteers obtain funding and work together to help the area flourish.
0
7 years
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Clean Street Exmouth
Clean Street Exmouth endeavours to keep the town clean and tidy by co-opting individuals who volunteer to adopt their street or area. We supply postcards for them to deliver to neighbours which invite them to help keep their street clean on a day-by-day basis. We also supply a postcard which adopters can use to organise 1-hour street cleans involving litter and weed removal. We cooperate with the district and town council cleaning services eg: joint 1-hour cleans to recruit new adopters and to show the improvement residents can make.
40
6 years
View
Bulford wombles
I am currently dismayed at the sheer amount of trash littered on Salisbury plain and surrounding villages. I am happy to clean myself and happy to work with others if they want.
0
5 years
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Better Thornton Heath
The group's aim is to make Thornton Heath a cleaner and greener environment for people to live.
0
10 years
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Cheddington Residents Litter Pick
We conduct two litter picks a year and have done so since may 1997. Usually in May and October on a Saturday morning.
0
27 years
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Bush Hill Park Residents Association
Bush Hill Park Residents\' Association organise 2 litter picks a year usually in April and October. We cover an area of about 1/2 a mile or so around BHP Station.
0
3 years
View
The Rudloe Mob
We are not really a group! We are a loose alliance! We started as dog walkers and photographers back in the 70s. I would be walking with our hound and stop to take a picture only to find that foreground rubbish had to be removed. This led to always taking bags for rubbish whenever I went out. For larger items (fly-tips etc) I would move them to a suitable roadside location and call the council who were (and are) very obliging. My “comrades” would do the same. This has been going on ever since (our last dog departed some years ago but the walking and photography continue).

My current (well actually for many years) “bete noire” is bagged dog crap. Twas quite funny, some years ago we had a serial crap flinger - it was everywhere: undergrowth, behind walls, brambles, trees etc. So, one weekend we decided to have a blitz on the stuff. We found about 250 bags in the undergrowth along Leafy Lane, over 100 in one location behind a dry stone wall and so on - a total of around 700 bags altogether. I was walking down my road with a bin bag of bagged dog crap over each shoulder when a neighbour stopped me and asked what I had in the bags! Since that time he and his wife have been inveterate litter pickers. The bagged dog crap problem continues. I have picked up about 30 in various locations over the past couple of weeks (this statement will be approximately true whenever you are reading this!). I used to think that this was just one halfwit on the loose, but it appears that this extraordinary behaviour is common practice. I believe (and I have written to Wilts CC about this) that the socially-acceptable practice of bagging dog crap, binning it and dumping it into landfill is an aberration. We have programmes on TV where ologists of various kinds look at ancient middens to find out how people lived. What will future ologists think of our society?

“Look - they used to wrap up their dog crap and bury it - how weird!”

Talking of weird, an odd incident occurred during my 23 Jan 2012 pick-up. I had a good bin-bag full of rubbish which I was attempting to stuff into the waste bin at Northleaze Mobile Home Park when one of a posse of locals shouted over “Oi - what do you think you’re doing?”. A small exchange ensued during which I explained that this was at least a weekly occurrence and I was tidying-up THEIR environment. But they were having none of it - “You can’t do that”, one said. I should say that this lady did offer to put the rubbish in her own bin but by this time the bin-bag was ripped and taking it out again would have seen the rubbish spilled on the ground. Anyway, their objection seemed to be one of possession - it was their bin! This would be fair enough if the bin was ever used but every time I deposit rubbish in that bin, it is empty (as it was on this occasion). It seems that they want theoretical of the bin without ever using it! Anyway my bin-bag was stuffed into the bin; the bin was emptied by the council the next morning and I stuffed a further bag of rubbish into it later that day. It is odd that no account is taken of rubbish lying in the street but clearance of that same rubbish invokes local disapproval!

Another anecdote - for many years, on Sunday mornings when out walking the dog, I would find an empty bottle of South African white wine (always South African) and an empty (70cl) bottle of vodka tightly knotted into a Tescos plastic bag in the lay-by in White Ennox Lane. What a wild time they must have had and what an interesting drive home.

The bizarre things you find when out collecting rubbish! Today, 25 Nov 2012, it was the “Bath & Wells Diocesan News”, No 264, December 1980 (see pic)! This was by the bus stop at the top of Box Hill. I can imagine the Bishop of Bath & Wells waiting for the bus in his vestments with his mitre and crosier (or is that Catholic bishops?) and unfortunately dropping his News on boarding the bus. One of the News items was the 1980 General Synod at which a major issue would be the ordination of women! Now, thirty-two years on, the Synod has been voting on women bishops. What a slow-moving organisation the C of E is!

By the way, the 20,000 or so bags picked up is an estimate, but probably a conservative one. My weekly pick-up is about 8 bags - 8x52x32(years) is about 13,000. I am, no doubt, doing a great disservice to the rest of the Mob in estimating their input as only 7,000 bags - watch out for the update.

The following table started in 2012, which I will try to update regularly, gives an idea of the scale of the ‘problem’.

1 Jan 2012: B3109, Skynet Drive, field edge 4+bags+mattress - called Wilts CC
2 Jan 2012: Leafy Lane, woods and playing fields, 5 bags
3 Jan 2012: Boxfields Road, Box Hill Common 3 bags+ fly tip - called Wilts CC
4 Jan 2012: Quarry Hill, 3 bags + bagged dog crap (BDC)
5 Jan 2012: B3109, A4 to Hare & Hounds 5 bags+ BDC (7 bags)
6 Jan 2012: Leafy Lane & A4 towards Corsham, 5 bags
7 Jan 2012: B3109, Skynet Drive, Park Lane, 4 bags+ BDC
8 Jan 2012: A4 towards Box, 2 bags
9 Jan 2012: B3109 & A4 towards Corsham, 4 bags
12 Jan 2012: Boxfields Road 1 bag+ small fly tip - called Wilts CC
16 Jan 2012: B3109 & A4 towards Corsham, 4 bags
17 Jan 2012: B3109, Skynet Drive, The Carriage Drive, Pound Mead, 7 bags
23 Jan 2012: B3109 & A4 towards Corsham, 3 bags + BDC
24 Jan 2012: B3109 & A4 towards Corsham, 2 bags
28 Jan 2012: Leafy Lane & B3109 from small Fiveways towards Corsham, 1 bag
7 Feb 2012: B3109 and A4 towards Corsham, 1 bag
8 Feb 2012: Leafy Lane and woodland, 2 bags
12 Feb 2012: A4 towards Box, 4 bags
13 Feb 2012: Rudloe Firs and A4 towards Corsham 10 bags (and still stuff remaining)
13 Feb 2012: (later) B3109, 2 bags
21 Feb 2012: B3109, 1 bag
23 Feb 2012: B3109, Leafy Lane, Leafy Lane Playing Fields, 14 bags

Okay, I guess you get the picture so with one month being very much like another I will discontinue the diary. This is a week-on-week, year-on-year occupation. The last pick-up listed above is instructive though - let me elaborate .. Leafy Lane Playing Fields is a 20 acre site at the south-eastern edge of the Cotswolds Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB). Its users include football clubs, cricket clubs etc but the principal user is AFC Corsham who do an outstanding job in providing opportunities for young people to play football. AFC Corsham runs 15 teams for youngsters between the ages of around 5 to 15/16. You can imagine therefore the number of youngsters provided for and the scores of parents who ferry their charges back and forth from home to ground and back. All fine BUT it appears that not one of the committee, managers and coaches, parents or others gives a hoot about the enormous piles of litter which are left to accumulate week after week. Rather than an AONB, Leafy Lane Playing Fields resembles a rubbish tip. The Rudloe Mob has an onslaught on the accumulation every couple of months or so. Of the 14 bags collected on 23rd February 2012, 10 came from the playing fields and this was just the tip of the iceberg (see photographs of some of what still remains). The state of the playing fields is, I believe, representative of the state of Britain. A 20-acre site frequented by a community of users who deposit rubbish then cheerfully wander through that same rubbish without giving it a second thought. With regard to litter, whether it is at community or national level, in general “we” couldn’t care less.

In the eighties “that cow” (as described by our local MP at the time, the 6th Earl of Kilmorey or Sir Richard Needham) appointed Richard Branson as the uncrowned king of litter - see this 2005 Guardian article on the subject https://www.guardian.co.uk/news/2005/sep/24/comment - but his campaign along with all others, like the long-established Keep Britain Tidy, failed or is failing. It is not good enough to have high-profile personalities, photo-shoots and high-salaried executives with meaningless job descriptions - take a look at the job description for the £40k plus Head of Communications and Marketing at Keep Britain Tidy:

OUTCOMES TO BE DELIVERED
*Implementation and delivery of the five year communications strategy and annual action plan
*Enhanced reputation of Keep Britain Tidy and its sub-brands
*Senior management feel supported through provision of strategic advice and guidance
*New income streams developed, for example, from behaviour change campaigns
*Stakeholders strategically managed and influenced
*Resources managed effectively within budget to meet to customer demand
*Visible leadership to the relevant communications teams as well as across the wider organisation
*Enhanced profile of the organisation with the relevant audiences
*Public membership scheme developed and successfully implemented, when agreed

Talk about Nero fiddling while Rome burns! We are drowning in a sea of rubbish! You can see the outcome of almost 60 years of Keep Britain Tidy in the small community area covered by this Litteraction webpage. YOU ACTUALLY HAVE TO GET OUT THERE AND PICK UP RUBBISH -REGULARLY!
20750
55 years
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