What is our garbage telling us?

The results of SoundWaters recent beach clean-ups are in. 244 volunteers came together over two days at Stamford’s three waterfront parks: Cove Island, Cummings and Boccuzzi. These locations are critical because a small gust of wind is the only thing preventing garbage in these parks from becoming irretrievable marine debris. Thank you to our volunteers who picked, lugged, sorted and counted over 300 lbs. of trash. Here is a snapshot of what they collected.

What else was collected? Check out the complete tally. 

Conspicuous By Its Scarcity? Plastic Bags!Last year, 145 plastic shopping bags were collected over just two parks (Cummings was not included until this year), but this fall, just five months after Stamford’s plastic bag ban went into effect, only 20 bags were found over all three locations, which leads us to ask two questions:

1.      What took us so long?

2.      Can we get to zero bags next year?

 Beach Clean-Ups Are Not Just A Fall Activity

If you’re enjoying the park this fall or winter, pay it forward by picking up some trash. If you find plastic bottle caps you can support Stamford middle school students by contributing them to the Million Bottle Cap Challenge. And mark your calendar because we’ll be back in the parks in the spring to see what you missed.