Do open container laws contribute to littering & GLASS?
 

I picked up another shard of glass today :mad:

Anyway, I've been wondering for some time if open container laws contribute to littering and broken glass on the roads.

I.E. People will drink in the cars with or without the laws. But, once the bottle is empty, the evidence goes out the window... only to be picked up by the next bicyclist down the road.

I'm not sure what the point is behind the laws. 50 years ago police would be guessing whether a person is intoxicated, and having drivers "walk the line". Today, just about every police officer has a breathalyzer in their car, and can check if a driver who appears to be intoxicated blows 0.08. Perhaps it discourages some people from drinking while driving, but does it really make a difference if they aren't impaired?

Every day I ride and see new liquor bottles on my home stretch of road, what concerns me is who is drinking all those bottles of liquor. It is really scary to think how many people are drinking while they drive.

I've had bottles and cans tossed out right in front of me, but not purposely thrown at me. Sure the open container laws contribute to littering, but motor vehicles in general contribute to more littering and debris. How many times have you ridden through an automobile accident debris field? I'm sure its many times, I know I have.

What you'll probably start noticing is that the broken glass is most prevalent around signs ... stop signs, corner ahead signs, speed limit signs, distance signs. Drunks seem to like the idea of throwing their glass bottles out the window to try to hit the signs. Usually they miss, so you'll see broken bottles that have landed 20 or 30 feet in front of or behind the sign. Sometimes they'll get close or they'll actually hit the sign.

It's a game.

I suspect that the open container laws may contribute a small proportion of the glass that hits the street.

I also think that people are so lazy that if the garbage can does not walk itself meekly to their car window and politely await reception of the container, then most of people in question will toss the container out the window anyways as going or waiting to find said container is just too much bother.

We are talking about intoxicated drivers here, eh? These are persons who have already demonstrated they lack some of the politeness and consideration, dare I say, love for one's fellow, necessary to make a civil society real.

One can be part of the solution, or part of the problem ...

Yes. This too. Entertainment. Of intoxicated persons.

Anyone else notice that the majority of roadside garbage on country and rural roads (at least around here) are beer bottles and cigarette packs?

Probably a little yes and no. Some people just litter. I live in an urban/urban core area and do notice an increase in jettisoned beer bottles on the weekends. Sometimes whole empty six packs will be thrown on the side of the road. However, the most trash I see by far is fast food crap and cigarette butts.

I suppose it is the beer bottles that I notice as they are what cause flats. But, yes, a lot of fast food stuff too, but they should mostly deteriorate in a couple of years. Glass soda bottles are almost all gone now. but I'm not seeing a lot of soda cans and plastic soda bottles around here.

I've had lit cigs thrown right next to me at a stop light. I've thought about picking them up and throwing them back into the cars. However, at least out of town, the numbers don't seem to be so horrible. I don't know the risk during fire season.

On a couple of occasions I've picked up intact beer bottles on the road as a preventative measure. However, I wonder if some people deliberately try to break the bottles on the road.

Anyway, the question is whether some of the beer drinkers are completely thoughtless... or if it is an intentional act for the purpose of circumventing laws that may not be relevant today anyway.

5 and 10p per bottle deposit helps make them worth returning.

yes one can but wonder .. ever been to Austria and Switzerland ? noted how little crap there is on the roadside ?. :thumb:
A Post Graduate study grant could be spent comparing the Littering cultures between the Cultures ,
Sociology, Urban studies, Psychology ..

wont change anything but at least there would be a Thesis on the subject to post.

The deposit helps some.
But it certainly hasn't been updated to keep up with inflation over the decades.

Slap a $1 deposit on the bottles, and many more will come back.

Yes, I remember as a kid when we rode around the neighborhood looking for bottles we'd earn enough from the deposit on 3 or 4 to go to the store and get a new bottle of soda - now you'd need about 10.

And I agree with the OP that the open container law may now be doing more harm than good. When police didn't have testing devices it made it easier for them to cite someone but now they can usually just do a quick breathalyzer check. And frankly I don't care if there's an open container in the car as long as the driver isn't intoxicated.