There were 17 deserted tents, 20 white lawn chairs, 30-40 folding chairs, 12 charcoal grills and dozens of coolers filled with everything from human waste to raw meat. That's just the beginning. The cleanup crew after the Texas-Ohio State game set a record, hauling away 43.6 tons of waste. By comparison, only 15.9 tons were hauled away after the opener against Miami of Ohio (subscription, so story is also posted in the comments tab).
Thursday, September 15, 2005
It's Garbage Time in Columbus
There were 17 deserted tents, 20 white lawn chairs, 30-40 folding chairs, 12 charcoal grills and dozens of coolers filled with everything from human waste to raw meat. That's just the beginning. The cleanup crew after the Texas-Ohio State game set a record, hauling away 43.6 tons of waste. By comparison, only 15.9 tons were hauled away after the opener against Miami of Ohio (subscription, so story is also posted in the comments tab).
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Tons of Trash
Football fans left a mess on campus after OSU-Texas
Kathy Lynn Gray
Columbus Dispatch
Who raised these people?
Kevin Wagner wonders that a lot after Ohio State University football games as he and his crew begin to shovel out the tons of litter fans leave behind.
After the Texas game Saturday, the campus around Ohio Stadium was quite literally trashed, with so many beer bottles, plastic cups and all other manner of rubbish that it resembled Woodstock after the hippies left.
"People drink too much and they just get stupid," figures Wagner, director of OSU roads and grounds. How else to explain tailgating fans who simply drop their chicken-wing bones on the ground?
When Wagner toured campus several hours after the loss to Texas, he found not only pop cans, paper plates and potato-chip bags but also enough furniture to outfit a garage sale.
He counted 17 deserted tents, 20 white lawn chairs, 30 to 40 broken folding chairs, 12 small charcoal grills, dozens of coolers filled with everything from human waste to raw meat and a partially burned sectional couch.
Among the more unsavory finds: piles of vomit and five pairs of soiled shorts from revel- ers who didn’t make it to the bathroom.
Adding to the litter pile were hundreds of pens, light sticks, key chains, bottle openers and Kirk Herbstreit masks that various companies gave away, Wagner said.
So many cigarette butts littered sidewalks along Lane Avenue that the cleanup crew sucked them up with a huge vacuum truck.
The cleanup took 405 hours of labor and cost the OSU athletics department $16,746 in pay. Workers began the work Sunday and weren’t finished until yesterday.
Wagner says it’s the worst after-game litter he’s seen since the 2002 Michigan game, when a potential national championship was on the line.
Workers hauled away 43.6 tons of waste. By comparison, 15.9 tons were hauled away after the Miami University game Sept. 3.
"When you bring 105,000 people to one place, there’s obviously going to be trash, but this is not a dump," said David Sweet, communications administrator for OSU Facilities Operations and Development. "It’s ridiculous that people treat it like this."
Wagner said that some places on Saturday probably didn’t have enough containers to dump trash, but that "at other sites, the Dumpster could be 10 steps away and they wouldn’t use it."
He said his crew works on Friday nights before home games to move the large metal containers and 55-gallon trash bins to locations where folks tailgate and party most.
"We then watch them from game to game, and try to rotate them to where they’re most needed," he said.
Some schools have found creative ways to nudge fans toward cleanliness, and OSU is planning to follow in their footsteps.
The University of Michigan last year recycled 17.57 tons of aluminum cans and plastic bottles during its six home football games. The items were collected with a mixture of recycling containers and careful trash cleanup. The school’s been recycling on game days since 1995.
Clemson University in South Carolina began passing out trash bags to football revelers in 2000 after garbage there mounted. By the third game of the season, the amount of loose trash had been significantly reduced.
Wagner now plans to give fans trash bags when they enter parking lots, beginning with this Saturday’s game against San Diego State, to encourage them to bag their garbage. Boxes of additional bags will be scattered at designated spots in the lots.
"I don’t mind picking up your bags of trash," Wagner said, although he’d prefer fans took them home.
He’s also hoping that by next year the school’s recycling department will begin efforts to reclaim cans and bottles, which make up the bulk of after-game trash.
"We’re trying to ask people to just respect the campus," Sweet said.
"It’s one of those things you learn in kindergarten: Treat it like it’s your back yard. We’re not trying to make a big stink about it but we’re just trying to get a message out: Be considerate."
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