Cape Breton Island has been listed as the #1 island destination in Canada, and was once the #2 designated island in the world by National Geographic. We have it all. Sunrises, sunsets, beaches, ocean fronts, cliffs, beautiful trails, golf courses and garbage!
Yes, garbage.
In the Cape Breton Regional Municipality (CBRM) it seems since COVID-19 erupted so has the amount of garbage I am seeing on my drives throughout my communities of Sydney Mines, Florence, Little Pond, Alder Point and the Tobin Road area. It seems out of control, and this seems to be the case all over the CBRM.
Look along our highways, our highway ramps, in ditches or whatever way the wind blows. Look in that direction and you will see garbage. Coffee cups, fast food wrappers, pizza boxes, styrofoam food containers, flyers and I could go on.
In District 1, the Northside Industrial Park, Pond Road Bridge, the pond in Little Pond, front and back beaches in Florence, the bottom of Tobin Road and Swivel Point in Sydney Mines. These areas seem to get hit the most when it comes to bags of garbage.
The CBRM has weekly garbage collection and a yearly heavy garbage pickup. Once a month the transfer station in North Sydney is open to take garbage. The Spar Road facility is open daily. So why can’t those residents who throw their garbage out their vehicle windows take their garbage home and place it curbside?
Garbage is not a CBRM problem. It is a problem stemming from those of us that live here, who think the garbage they throw out just disappears. How much of that makes its way into our oceans, lakes and streams if we see so much of it in our communities? I cannot Imagine what environmental effect that garbage is having on our sea creatures.
This garbage makes our communities dirty looking and very uninviting for our designation across the country.
Come on residents of the CBRM. Let’s make garbage our enemy, and educate each other on the harms of throwing garbage out your window. Teach your children and grandchildren or have them teach you how to properly dispose of garbage. Let’s get it done and clean up this mess.
As I said in my opening, we have it all here in Cape Breton. We just need to clean it up so when the tourists come flocking back to our #1 Island destination, they see our true beauty, with no garbage thrown all over our beautiful Island.
Gordon MacDonald
CBRM councilor District 1
