Confessions of an 'Adopt

An Adopt a Highway sign along near Pine City, Minnesota.

I am a volunteer with Frederick County's Office of Highway Operations Adopt-a-Road program and pick up litter on about a mile stretch of Crestwood Boulevard, between Ballenger Creek Pike and New Design Road.

It's one of the best and worst things I’ve ever done.

It is undoubtedly a needed function, and I’m proud to help. But trash is never-ending and wears me down.

I don't do it to be a hero, although many people honk and yell "thanks" to me as they drive by. I do it because all this trash truly offends me. I hate looking at it, so I try to eliminate it. I know it harms the environment and animals and decreases property values. But I’m almost ashamed to say that it is mostly aesthetics that gets me out on the highway almost every day.

I also do it for exercise. I know that sounds crazy, but this is my mindset: "I’m taking daily walks anyway, so why not bend over and pick up some trash while I’m at it?" All these "bend-overs" approximate sit-ups but accomplish a public good at the same time. You can't say that about exercising at a gym or in your basement.

Highway Operations staff tells me that approximately 85 miles of county roads have been adopted. That means volunteers (individuals and teams) have agreed to pick up trash on their adopted roads at least four times per year and report their efforts back to the county. This sounds impressive until you consider that the county maintains over 1,300 miles of roadway. Unfortunately, what we’re picking up is just a drop in the bucket of the available roadway trash.

If you are so inclined, you may volunteer to adopt a stretch of road in Frederick County by contacting the Department of Highway Operations at 301-600-1564 or by emailing the extremely helpful staffers Mike Ramsburg ([email protected]) or Casandra Fitzpatrick ([email protected]). Both can explain the program and help you get started.

There are currently 45 teams in the program, which are comprised of hundreds of volunteers. Approximately 70% of the teams are civic or neighborhood groups and about 20% are religious groups. Ten percent are families or individuals like me.

MY EXPERIENCESome stretches of road are easier to pick up than others. Judging from what I’ve seen, mine is not so bad.

It helps if your road is close to a residential area. Residents, at least in fairly affluent areas, tend to pick up their own trash or not throw it in the first place. Much of my road is residential but is unfortunately bookended by two strip shopping centers with a Wawa and an Auto Zone along the way. Trash from these establishments is plentiful, to say the least.

There are also several schools nearby. I’m not blaming all students who walk this stretch. I know many are fine young people. But I have personally seen some go into Wawa for a drink and candy bar, finish it, and promptly throw their trash on the ground. They don't even try to hide it. It seems second nature to them.

When people honk to thank me, I usually don't pay too much attention. My feeling is I’m going for a walk anyway. Why would I not pick up trash along the way? Other times I am annoyed because I don't want thanks; I want help. Or better yet, I want people to stop throwing their trash out. Unfortunately, I am beginning to see most people as potential trash throwers, not thankful citizens.

A few walkers I pass by when picking up trash thank me and claim to do the same thing in their own neighborhoods or in the past. I find this sad and funny at the same time because I’ve never, ever seen anyone bend over to pick up trash they are walking over. Not once.

Why is this? Such a simple act could help so much.

Could it be that there is a sense of futility in picking up litter? After all, as soon as you pick up one batch, a new one blows in. Could it also be that old, elementary-school mindset of "I didn't do it!" Most likely, people just don't notice trash like I do, or they don't care.

THE PSYCHOLOGY OF LITTERINGThe psychology of littering fascinates me. I can't figure out what could possibly motivate us to do such an antisocial thing when it is so easy to do the right thing.

Studies show that some littering is accidental — like the trash that blows out of dumpsters and garbage trucks — but most is indeed intentional.

This fact is stupefying to me. I can think of nothing simpler than bringing my trash home and throwing it in the garbage can where it belongs. It is second nature. I do this not because I am some kind of do-gooder but because, to me, this is the simple nature of things. At the risk of sounding terribly old-fashioned, I don't have other people shop for me, clean my house or deliver my food. Those are my jobs. And I sure don't want other people picking up my trash for me.

According to a report done by Keep America Beautiful, people are more likely to litter when they feel "no sense of ownerships for parks, walkways, beaches and other public spaces." This sense of ownership, instead, is found around people's homes and neighborhoods.

"It seems the reason people litter is not because they think it's OK," says Joshua Rottman, assistant professor of psychology at Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. "It's because they think it's the easy thing to do. It's a moral hypocrisy. People know it's wrong, but they do it because it's easy."

Who are these trash throwers? (Litterbug is too cute and polite a term!)

In the 1980s, the Institute for Applied Research found that people most likely to litter were 18- to 35-year-old males. Not a big surprise, right?

In more recent surveys, this finding was corroborated: 72% of people observed in the act of deliberate littering were found to be under the age of 30. Nationally, males were found to be responsible for 72% of all intentional littering.

What could be driving this young male carelessness? A youthful disdain for authority? A not yet fully developed brain? The lack of consequences for this seemingly minor act of civil disobedience? The inability to trace their actions to eventually harming the environment? A sort of hopelessness to ever being a functioning part of society? Unfortunately, pinpointing the reasons for littering have proved elusive to the research.

OBSERVATIONSI hate to say this, but my findings are iron-clad, largely corroborated by the available research, and were developed over several years of picking up trash along my stretch of highway: The lower the economic status of the area, the more trash is strewn about. There is much more trash around apartments than single-family homes or townhouses in the Frederick area, and there's much more around subsidized housing.

I drive around Frederick quite a bit for my part-time job. Obvious lower-income areas have much more litter than their share. Psychologists have observed that the presence of existing litter was strongly predictive of littering behavior. It's a vicious circle. If you’re in a place that's already got a lot of litter, you’re much more likely to litter. That's one reason I’m out there almost every single day. I hope to make littering stand out and perpetrators feel just a little bit bad.

Of course, before people can throw out trash, they need trash to throw.

I’ve had my hands on what seems like tons of trash, and I can tell you one of the biggest sources of trash is our old friend McDonald's. It seems intuitive. The food at McDonald's is among the cheapest and lowest quality available, so of course the folks at the lower end of the economic spectrum disproportionately get much of their food there and are disproportionately willing to throw the residual trash on the ground.

In my little area in Frederick, I’ve got two liquor stores nearby, and they are the next biggest offenders. Miniature bottles of liquor seem especially made to be thrown out. They are not very visible, consumed quickly, and may not be welcome at home in the trash. I’d like to see them outlawed.

I even stopped in at one of the liquor stores on my route to ask if they would be interested in helping me pick up the trash their customers make. They looked at me like I had two heads.

Other major offending items are plastic grocery bags, napkins, fast food bags, soda cups and bottles, beer cans, cigarette packs, water bottles, Slim Jim wrappers (of all things) and candy bar wrappers. It's probably not a coincidence that many of these items aren't good for you.

One person on my route is so brazen, they tear up their junk mail with name and address clearly visible, and throw it in the median of Crestwood Boulevard in the very same spot every day. Naturally, I’ve called the sheriff's department on this person many times. Deputies are sympathetic and try to talk with this person, but when they show up at his door, he simply refuses to answer. The deputies tell me there is nothing they can do in that case. I don't want to get this person in trouble, I just want him to stop.

Another person (or maybe the same one) disposes of a Wawa coffee cup, a Sizzli package, two or three empty snack pie packages, napkins and — get this — a bottle of laxatives every single day. I’m sympathetic but fearful. This person has some serious problems and may not be around much longer to litter. How do I know it's the same person? The same items are in the very same spot every day. They must walk to work and gleefully eat and dispose of breakfast packaging along the way.

I do get a little humor out of this.

One time I found a shopping cart along my route, so I just started pushing it and throwing my trash in there instead of the kitchen garbage bags I usually carry. I was dressed in my rattiest clothes of course, so I’m sure I must have looked homeless. Wouldn't you know it that about that time, my son drove by and honked. Later, I found out he asked my wife if I was OK.

I suppose I’ve made my corner of the Earth a little better. My stretch of highway is in pretty good shape and better than most but never perfect. The truth is, before I started doing this, I was pretty much oblivious to all the trash along roads. I suppose most people are. But now I am super sensitive to it, and it disgusts me. I guess I’ll keep doing it, but I have to say I’m a bit sorry I ever started this in the first place.

Gary Bennett is a longtime Frederick resident who spends his time hiking, biking, volunteering and providing childcare for his grandchildren. He is married and retired from his career as a nonprofit marketing executive.

1. U.S. roadways accumulate over 51 billion pieces of litter per year.

2. There are an estimated 6,729 pieces of litter per roadway mile.

3. On average, there are 152 pieces of litter for every U.S. resident.

4. Litter cleanups cost the U.S. an estimated $11.5 billion annually.

5. The presence of litter in your neighborhood or community lowers property values by 7%.

Source: Roadrunner Recycling, 2022

Thanks for this write-up of your experience and for your part in picking up the trash! The presence of litter does seem to give permission for more litter. In some cultures, pretty much everyone views littering as very bad behavior and there is none, so socioeconomic stories aren't the driver. Our culture tells a consumeristic "disposable" story. Use it, throw it away, buy more. What could go wrong?

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