SO MUCH TRASH IN LEXINGTON, KENTUCKY!!!

 

My son, Jason, and I drove to Lexington, Kentucky, on Sunday to meet up with my son and his wife, Mike & Liz, who live in Tennessee.  I was shocked at the amount of trash in Lexington!  I thought Akron was bad.  The trash in Akron is nothing compared to what we saw in Lexington.

We were leaving a Sheetz gas station, right off 71, and my son said, "Wow, Mom!  You could pick up 2,000 pieces right there!"

And as we walked the dogs the next morning around the neighborhood of the Air B & B we were staying at, there was litter everywhere we looked.  Had I had my trash grabber with me, I would have picked it all up.

I got home and googled, "Litter in Lexington, Kentucky," just to see what I could find out about why there was so much more trash there than in Ohio.

I found this amazing picture of trash along the freeway.  Do you realize that the trash in Ohio would look just like this if we didn't keep picking it up?  It seems like it does no good.  We clean, and a week later, it's all trashed up again, but if we didn't clean it up, it would not go away.  It takes 450 years for plastic bottles to biodegrade!  It takes even longer, 500 years, for a foam cup to decompose, so that means most trash is not going away.

This picture looks like the trash can was dumped out on the sidewalk, but no.  That's just trash that people drop as they walk along.

I read that Keep Lexington Beautiful joined with Keep America Beautiful to launch a campaign against cigarette butt litter.  Did you know that cigarette butts are the most common type of litter on earth?  And it can take up to 10 years for a cigarette butt to biodegrade!

Picking up cigarette butts is miserable, but when I see them at at an intersection, I always pick them up.

This woman, Teresa Rakes, lives in Lexington, and she started picking up litter around her community in 2023, about the same time I did.  

She was recently honored by Lexington's leaders.  I hope more people join in, like they have here in Akron.  Kentucky is such a beautiful state.  I was very disappointed to see so much litter when we visited.

The next time I visit the state of Kentucky, I'm taking my trash cart, trash grabber, bucket and gloves with me!