The Greenfield

Announcements[]

NB!

1) I have signed our group up for the presentation on 4th of April, 13.10. Please, change the date and time if you think, this one does not suit us, but note, that there is not so many free slots left.

2) As Enfield still have not respond to our request, it is worth to try to use some other supporters. For instance, Keep Britan Tidy compaign is aimed to provide us with all the equipment we need for the event. All we need is to tell them the date of our event, so that we could make our compaign as a part of a bigger one. http://www.thebigtidyup.org/tidyups_edit.aspx?newuser=1

AnnaBarsukovaMDX 10:43, March 24, 2011 (UTC)

About our compaign[]

In general our compaign is one of those, that are aimed to straggle with environmental issues. The main idea is to start with something, that we can really do something about. For this purpose Snakes Lane, that is going to become a dump, seems to be a great target.

Basically our compaign is supposed to work in three directions:

making awareness of land pollution
clearing Snakes Lane
making it never happen again

Media[]

Posters provided by Keep Britain Tidy compaign
Leaflets provided be Keep Britain Tidy compaign
staff for disrtibution
main event flyers
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Photos taken along Snakes Lane

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Film made on Snakes Lane by Arturas Kavaliauskas

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Commissioned by Discovery Networks EMEA, and created by Jellyfish Pictures, the film is an animated time lapse following the decomposition of a tin can over 50 years, depicting the impact of failing to recycle rubbish.

Research Dossier[]

Key Facts and background[]

Snakes Lane pollution, that we are going to compaign about, is only an example of a huge problem. According to The Telegraph, MPs get more letters complaining about litter and dog fouling than anything else, which is a great evidence of the fact, that littering in the UK has reached quite high rates. Even though littering is an offence under S87 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 and the fine for it can be as up to £2,500, this problem still exists. As it is claimed, an estimated 122 tons only of cigarette-related litter is dropped every day across the UK. Actually this problem should be considered as ‘serious’, because littering has a lot of negative effects.

First of all, litter is detrimental for the environment as almost any type of litter takes a long time to disappear naturally. Of course, degradability depends on climate and circumstances, but as it is claimed by National Geographic journal, under unfavourable conditions estimated time spans can be as long as:

Plastic bottles – indefinitely

Aluminium cans 80–100 years

Tin cans 50 years

Glass - indefinitely

Plastic bags 10–20 years

Cigarette butts - up to 2 years

Orange peel/banana skins - up to 2 years

Despite the fact that some kinds of litter are more or less degradable, they still can cause environmental issues. For example, plastic pieces have been found in the stomachs of fish, birds, whales, and other marine creatures that mistake them as food, swallowing harmful plastic and toxic chemicals. So litter is extremely dangerous for birds and animals. It is estimated that every year over 1 million seabirds and 100,000 turtles and sea mammals die of litter related causes. Statistics also shows, that over 69,000 animals were killed or injured by litter in Britain in 2007. There is no doubt, that numbers has only increased.
However, dumping causes not only affects environment, but literally harms people. Every year there are numerous vehicle accidents caused by litter. As Green Eco Services has announced, 25000 accidents are caused in USA each year by litter.
Another negative aspect that is related to littering is an increased amount of rats, which population has boomed to 60 million due to the huge amounts of litter around. This means there are now almost as many rats as people in the UK.
What is more, litter has a great economical impact. For instance, it costs Falkirk Council somewhere in the region of £3 million a year. And since all clean up costs are met through the Council Tax, it costs taxpayers in excess of £850 million annually to clear the streets of England, not including parks or other public spaces.
Therefore, the only solution to all these problems and particularly to the Snakes Lane pollution can be to make people stop littering and start cleaning. As it has been proven, people are less likely to drop litter in a place that is already spotless. Such phenomenon is known as ‘Disneyworld Effect’.

AnnaBarsukovaMDX 13:09, March 2, 2011 (UTC)

How could change happen?[]

Our campaign is not just about cleaning Snake Lane. The purpose is to send message to people around us that the best way to make environment cleaner is to start from small things - from ourselves. However we need some help from few companies in order to achieve the best results. To begin with, though Snake Lane belongs not to Enfield, I believe it would be still a good idea to contact them and ask for their support: provide us with recycling containers, gloves other necessary equipment. I believe that there will not be necessary to put any pressure on them as I have found on their web-site saying: ‘You can also request additional recycling containers, arrange special bulky waste collections and many other services the team provides’. For this reason, they would probably accept to cooperate with us. Then, I believe it is essential to contact company which makes posters and signs. I have found one named ‘the original metal sign CO’. asking to cooperate with us for this company might be harder, though I don’t believe that any pressure would make them to ‘want’ to help us. That is why I believe we have just to contact them, to tell our purpose and just ask for a help. Also we could tell them that we would put their name on our posters, so it would also be a good advertisement for them.

But the biggest organization that could affect change would be volunteers who would come to help us to make a tiny part of London more beautiful.

Onute 21:31, March 1, 2011 (UTC)