What Do You Do About People Who Think The Neighborhood Is Their Trash Can? [Block Talk]

Patch reader Geri posed this question about littering in an email to Block Talk, Patch’s exclusive neighborhood etiquette column:

“Where do some people get the idea it’s OK to toss out their trash from their car window?”

We wonder that, too. How is this still happening in 2025? Also, what can be done about littering in general, whether the garbage is flung from a car window or left at a park or some other public gathering place?

We are better than we were.

Keep America Beautiful, a nonprofit community improvement and highway beautification organization founded in 1953 and championed by Lady Bird Johnson, reported in a 2021 study that littering had decreased by 54 percent in the past decade.

Still, the study found nearly 50 billion pieces of trash along U.S. roadways and waterways in 2020. There was a significant decrease in littered cigarette butts, fast-food containers and soft drink containers; however, some types of litter increased.

Between 2009 and 2020, there was an uptick in the amount of discarded cardboard, food-packaging film, and bottles and cans for beer, sports drinks, and water.

Clearly, some people still think the world is their trash can.

What should you do?

Is it OK to shame litterbugs a little? Say you see someone about to leave fast-food wrappers on a neighborhood park picnic table. Is it OK to walk over and say something like this, “Hey, I thought you might not know there’s a trash can right over there”?

Or, should you just pick up the trash and walk it over to the can without comment, chalking it up to your bit to keep the park and neighborhood tidy?

If you see someone toss trash out a car window and can get the license plate number, should you turn them in? Would it depend on what was thrown out — for example, a a lighted cigarette that might ignite a wildfire, a large amount of garbage, or a beer can that might indicate an underage or drunken driver versus something small and biodegradable?

Should you campaign for a “bottle bill” similar to laws in effect in 10 states (California, Connecticut, Hawaii, Iowa, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, New York, Oregon and Vermont)? Studies have shown that requiring a deposit on soft drink and beer, wine and alcohol containers decreases not only the number of those containers thrown out the highway but other litter as well.

Give us your thoughts. Why, in 2025, do some people still think it’s OK to litter, and what can be done about it? Just fill out the form below. As always, we don’t collect email addresses.

Editor’s note: This survey closed on Jan. 10.

About Block Talk

Block Talk is an exclusive Patch series on neighborhood etiquette — and readers provide the answers. If you have a topic you'd like for us to consider, email beth.dalbey@patch.com with “Block Talk” as the subject line.

Catch up on Block Talk