Some Bay Ridgites are saying that litter along Fourth Avenue has gotten worse since the city removed public garbage cans at the request of a local panel that thought doing so would make the neighborhood cleaner.
At the request of Community Board 10, the Department of Sanitation removed 14 trash cans from Fourth Avenue between Ovington Avenue and 68th Street on May 9 as part of a test to see if the removal of the cans — which had become magnets for household trash — would decrease the amount of litter in the area.
But the litter has gotten worse.
“The garbage is beginning to pile up in the street, people are dumping everywhere,” said Lorraine Principe, who lives on 72nd Street. “I can’t understand why [the city] would do this.”
Workers in the area agreed.
“I work here everyday and see people leave their cups and paper on the floor,” said Antonios Piberakis, a delivery man for Yannis restaurant on 69th Street at Fourth Avenue. “What are they supposed to do? Carry it home?”
Coincidentally, as we spoke to Piberakis, a woman threw her coffee cup on the street as she walked by.
“You see!” he said. “You see what they do!”
The removal of the cans comes a year after CB10 voted to ask the agency to get rid of them because they would overflow with trash — usually after residents illegally dumped household waste in them.
The agency initially ignored the board’s request, but in April of this year, it said it would remove the cans.
CB10 member Greg Ahl, who’s backed the plan to ban the cans for years, said that the cleanliness of the area has improved over the last two weeks.
“I have been monitoring the corners several times a day and have found that where was no increase in litter,” said the board’s Environmental Committee Chairman Greg Ahl at Monday night’s board meeting. ”All in all, promising results.”
The Department of Sanitation is also monitoring the area to see whether the removal of the cans will be permanent. A spokesman for the agency said that data would be analyzed in a week.
