#two hands project

[plastic-pollution-coalition]

The Two Hands Project has a straightforward approach to plastic pollution: Take 30 minutes and two hands to clean up your world anytime, anywhere. The Two Hands Project is a PPC member organization.

[greendera-blog]

Two Hands, Four Hours

I went back down to Coles Mill Road today to keep cleaning by the Cooper River. After I finished cleaning last week, I saw that I still had a lot of work to do along the south side of the river. Today I decided to start on the west side of that stretch of road. The strip of land between the street and the river is a lot wider than on the other end. I planned to get all the way down to where I stopped last week, but little did I know, I was in for a trash-suprise.

Its such a smaller area, but the amount of trash was phenominally larger. Last week I only filled up 2 or three bags. This time I filled 9 bags full of cans and bottles, and 5 bags full of trash, in a much smaller zone. Apparently this has been a trash throw-off point for a long time. I put together quite a timeline based off the different products I picked up. Soda bottles from back before they came in plastic bottles or cans, then cans and beer bottles with the pull-off tabs, and the todays plastic bottles, cans and 40oz bottles. I'm also a little worried because the only way most of that trash gets down there is from people throwing it out of their cars, and the amount of beer bottles and cans would indicate a lot of drunk drivers.

Looking at the task before me, I decided that it would be easiest if I worked in sections and made piles that I could go around and pick up later. I ended up with a lot of piles of garbage. Unfortunately, a huge problem that I had was that since apparently this area has never been cleaned, there are layers of fallen leaves and garbage, especially up by the road. I was walking in leaves, only to hear the crunching of plastic under my feet every other step. And on top of that, literally, the people that live across the street use this area as a place to dump their lawn clippings and bush trimmings. Who knows how much trash is buried down there.

I wasn't expecting this much. I had trouble fitting all the bags into my car. I needed to bring all this home to make sure it goes into the trash and recycling. This is a daunting task. How many other areas like this are there, where roads run parallel to rivers and people just toss trash into the woods?

Summary:

9 bags full of glass and plastic bottles and cans 5 bags full of rubbish - plastic food and candy wrappers 1 front end of a car: shattered bumper, headlight, license plate and one axle 18 scrapes and punctures from sticker bushes 1 tick on my arm 11 cyclists enjoying their afternoon and giving me weird looks 1 woman walking her child in a stroller that scowled at me pretty hard 1 couple out for a jog, confused at why I was down in the woods

1 older cyclist who stopped and verbally applauded me for my efforts and wanted to know if the county was helping me dispose of the trash (no). He filled me in on some info, including that this land is actually a county park, and that there used to be a mill down by the water back in the early 1900s, thus the name of the road. He said if was physically able to, he'd be doing the same thing.

One thing that bummed me out: this birds nest that is 50% plastic

I was pretty stoked to find out about the Two Hands Project, a collaborative effort to clean the world. Its nice to know that there are other people that are out to make the same positive changes in the world that I am. Check out their site, and "Like" them on facebook. And most of all, get involved!