by Kayden Ward
As you walk around campus, you will notice a few different things: the beautiful scenery, the interesting infrastructure and a distinct lack of trash cans. While talking to students around campus, this topic comes up a lot. Where are the trash cans and why do we not have more? Not having trash cans promotes littering on campus, runs the risk of disease and causes people to hold onto trash much longer than necessary.
Littering is an environmental issue that comes with not having trash cans on campus. We’ve all seen friends litter and had to reprimand them. It is harder to convince a person not to litter when there are no trash cans anywhere. Not only is littering expensive to clean up, but it is found that open trash attracts animals. While animals are cute and plentiful in Wooster, without trash cans, they are attracted to the smells that come along with trash. Trash cans allow for scents and the trash itself to be hidden from the animals to avoid unwanted critters from trespassing on campus. This also prevents having to call animal control.
Littering harms the environment and leads to a higher risk of disease. According to the National Ocean Service, “Discarded trash can become a component of nonpoint source pollution runoff. Plastics and metals degrade very slowly over time and can leach harmful chemicals into the environment.” Trash is a breeding ground for illness and can cause outbreaks of disease. The World Health Organization explained that “Poor waste collection leads to environmental and marine pollution and can block water drains. Resulting flooding and other standing waters in waste items favor cholera and vector-borne diseases such as malaria and dengue.” With the increase in recalls of food due to outbreaks of disease, there is no need to also contaminate our water supply due to something completely avoidable.
A lack of trash cans also causes people to hold onto trash longer. People often complain that they hold onto trash and forget about it, causing them to wash the trash with their clothes. I personally have experienced walking around campus holding trash in my pockets and forgetting about it due to there being no trash cans around. It is inconvenient and causes your clothes to still be dirty. It also causes debris to fall into the washer and mess it up. Fallen debris can cause the washers to lose their efficiency and build up mold and mildew, which leads to clothes smelling bad and people having allergic reactions.
Some could argue that cleaning all the trash cans would be difficult and installations could be expensive, but Matt Bruning, a representative from the Ohio Department of Transportation says that “it costs $4 million annually to pick up other people’s garbage off the interstate.” It would be a lot cheaper and safer for everyone to buy trash cans for the campus.
In conclusion, the College of Wooster should invest in more trash cans around campus. Not only to make the lives of those around campus easier, but to avoid outbreaks of disease and animals. Ensuring that our campus remains clean and beautiful is important and should be maintained in all ways possible.
