Why do people throw out old motors, bicycles, anything metal into rivers and lakes instead of a junk yard or the trash system?

I have been watching magnet fishing and people love to toss stuff over bridges without a second thought on the environmental impact. Hiding evidence I can almost understand but not lawnmowers, car batteries, etc.

It seems deeper fines should be made to discourage this terrible behavior.

Chef_Boyardee ,

It's organic recycling. It's better for the earth.

NeatNit ,

I think there may actually be some truth to this, but I don't know nearly enough to say so with any confidence

GluWu , (edited )

https://youtube.com/watch?v=JiOXLk9Xj1E

sp3tr4l ,

Throw it all into volcanoes?

kakes ,

I see answers for why people dump junk, but not why they dump it on rivers/lakes in particular.

To remedy that: dumping junk isn't legal, and water is good at hiding things. If someone leaves their TV out on the street or whathaveyou, it might be traced back to them, but that's less likely in a river.

Kolanaki ,
@Kolanaki@yiffit.net avatar

Laziness and/or poverty. It costs money to dump stuff like that legally most of the time. It also requires going somewhere usually not close to you.

vk6flab ,
@vk6flab@lemmy.radio avatar

I doubt that anyone has researched the origin of such junk in detail.

If it doesn't fit in your rubbish bin, generally it costs time, effort and money to properly dispose of things. Tossing it off a bridge is efficient.

Likely there's a not inconsiderable proportion of anti-social behaviour, like stealing a bike and throwing it into a waterway afterwards.

dual_sport_dork ,
@dual_sport_dork@lemmy.world avatar

Mostly the second point. I would wager from experience that the majority of small man-portable conveyances that wind up at the bottom of lakes and rivers are there because they were stolen and thrown there. Bikes, motorcycles, rental scooters, shopping carts, etc. The reason is hooliganism, and the contributing factors are alcohol and teenagerhood.

FuglyDuck , (edited )
@FuglyDuck@lemmy.world avatar

Just for the record, teenage hooligans-in my experience -are actually preferable to the adult hooligans.

Seriously. Teenagers might get drunk and do stupid shit but they’re scared of getting caught and run away. Many times they’ll even clean up after themselves if you’re not a total dick.

Adults tend to stand their ground and pick fights.

(Also, every demographic you care to name steal shit. Sobriety, income, race. None of it matters.)

originalucifer ,
@originalucifer@moist.catsweat.com avatar

people are inherently lazy. fines are only for poor people.

if you want to solve the problem, provide an easy method for the general public to correctly dispose of shit, and let them know about it.

the issue being that that kind of social awareness and general action costs money, and conservatives would rather watch the world burn than have their taxes raised.

spujb ,

ye, and if you don’t like the negative connotations of “lazy,” substitute it with “attentive to making cost effective decisions.”

if it costs more, in time or in money, for an individual to properly dispose of something than the negative consequences of just chucking it in a river, the latter option will be chosen. this hilights the importance of community organization to set up a means for disposal, to make it accessible, and to make it known. by working together both the labor cost of disposal and the externality cost of environmental damage can be limited beyond what any individual could do.

TheFeatureCreature ,
@TheFeatureCreature@lemmy.world avatar

Lack of proper disposal facilities and/or fees for using said facilities. Easier to dump something in a lake or in the bushes than driving 40 minutes across town to a special facility and paying $30+ to dispose of it properly.

bionicjoey ,

Everyone who disposes properly has to pay a fee. The only ones who have to pay the fine for dumping are those that get caught.

Solution: turn responsible disposal into a game, where if you can successfully sneak your trash to the correct section of the disposal center without anyone noticing, you get paid the amount you would have had to pay as a fee.

ryathal ,

Depending on what it is the cost is a lot more than $30 which is a big reason these things get dumped. An old fridge with toxic coolant could be closer to $1k.

Fosheze ,

Fun fact, those refrigerents can be (and are required to be) reclaimed and sold to recyclers. Old refrigerants that can no longer be legaly produced are actually worth an absurd amount of money when reclaimed because they can still be used but because they can't legally be manufactured or imported the only source for them is stuff reclaimed out of other systems. Companies will pay absurd amounts of money to not have to refit their refrigeration systems to work with new refrigerants.

So if you have an old appliance still full of something like R-12 or R-22 then you have a gold mine to someone with the right equipment and certifications.

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