“Any success stories on getting public trash cans replaced?”

Photo by PoPville flickr user Gerry Suchy

“Dear PoPville,

My husband and I have been Petworth residents for a few years now, and when we first purchased our house, we had public trash cans on our street. Over the last year or so, two cans have been removed and not replaced. I have tried twice, unsuccessfully, to get the cans replaced. The latest response from our commissioner was that “the city is moving away from having cans close by residential homes because residents tend to leave their trash there rather than in their own bins.”

Is this true across the district? And, more importantly, is there anything we can do? I hope the city can appreciate the irony of removing trash cans because they are being used.

Our street has had a noticeable increase of litter, and it’s also tough because I often walk my dogs, alone, late at night, and I appreciated being able to stay right on my block, where I know most of my neighbors and I felt safe – I could easily walk a block to toss out my dogs’ poop bags. But now, if we’re doing a late night bathroom break, I have to walk 3-4 blocks to the nearest garbage can.

I’d love to get more information on this (i.e., if this is happening across the district, if anyone has any points of contact with DPW, if anyone has any success stories on how they remedied the trash situation, etc.).”