Metro Jacksonville

I keep hearing about police agencies cracking down on speeders to increase their revenue, what do you guys think about smokers tossing their butts out of their cars? Should they be fined for doing so?

Fined is so polite - how about flogging?  Or being made to eat their own cigarette butts - and any others that may be on the ground near where they threw theirs.

But, realistically, the police have more pressing matters.

Not only fined, but made to clean up as well to go along with the punishment. Ever stop at a red light, looked to the side and see hundreds of butts on the ground.

Every street corner here in Jacksonville seems to be littered with cigarette butts.  Since I am not a smoker, I cannot claim to understand how inconvenient it is to have butts in your car's ashtray, but to me, it is incredibly unsightly and frustrating to see those butts all over the place (along with the rest of the motorist's stupid trash)


On the positive side, at least cig. butts are biodegradable (unlike soda bottles, drive thru straws, etc.)

A cigarette butt is litter and by tossing it out, that is littering.

Yeah, ifwe don't get a good rain for over a week, they really start to pile up. The best is when it rains enough to get them flowing, but stop before the drain. We didn't have that issue today in my part of Mandarin for sure.

I think it should be a small fine but it should be stopped.

Quote from: Charles Hunter on June 25, 2009, 10:45:14 PM
Fined is so polite - how about flogging?  Or being made to eat their own cigarette butts - and any others that may be on the ground near where they threw theirs.

But, realistically, the police have more pressing matters.

(http://botit.botany.wisc.edu/images/veg/Prairie_Lecture_1/Prairie_fire_I_VK.low.jpg)

Not really Charles, it might be a bit different here at home, however... One typically windy Oklahoma summer day, whilst driving through the bone dry wheat fields a car some distance ahead tossed out the butts. As I passed I thought I saw smoke, so I slowed and turned to double check. Before I could get back to the spot, the 6' high flames were leaping the fence line and racing up a hill. Kingfisher, Cashion, Piedmont and Crescent all scrambled their fire departments. I parked off a side road (at the time a city councilman myself) helped direct my own guys in. A farmer working just over the hill with a big cat dozier, finally saw me trying to flag him down and after some quick hand signals went into action cutting a line in front of the flaming wall. It was so fast, almost cartoon like. I wouldn't have EVER believed 30+ acres could be quick roasted so darn fast from some mindless smokers little crime. We finally got it stopped and thank God it didn't become several hundred acres. The worst part is you couldn't have outran it on foot.  

OCKLAWAHA

DON'T TRASH JACKSONVILLE. Sounds good, where did this City mantra go? Perhaps it left in the Mayor's 2nd term.

This is why you shouldnt be throwing things out of your car, especially half lite butts.

Don't stop with butts, what about all the trash that seems to congregate around roads? Where does the trash come from? Billy Bob's pickup? Probably many of the same people who don't care about their cig butts.

Ock, I saw a thrown ciggy butt set the median of the Southside Connector on fire a couple months ago.  Fortunately, the wind wasn't very high that day, or it could have been a problem for all those apartments if it was a west wind.

I forgot about the don't trash jacksonville ads! They were pretty good.
http://s.ytimg.com/yt/swf/watch-vfl105354.swf
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLaGIW7r0jI (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLaGIW7r0jI)
Anyway, I would never think to throw out a coke can or something, but people toss smokes out the window like it's nothing. Always at a red light and I have to smell it. Very annoying.

Obviously, I think these people should be fined for littering. It's easy revenue for JSO too!

Quote from: Charles Hunter on June 25, 2009, 11:20:35 PM
Ock, I saw a thrown ciggy butt set the median of the Southside Connector on fire a couple months ago.  Fortunately, the wind wasn't very high that day, or it could have been a problem for all those apartments if it was a west wind.

Had I not seen it, I wouldn't have believed any of it. I just NEVER thought something so small, not even in a flame, could set off a massive wall of flame like that so damn fast. Good thing Florida doesn't have Oklahoma wind, it's not unusual to see wind approach tropical storm strength on a clear and sunny day. It's so regular, you have to adjust your habits to it. For example NEVER open car doors on both sides at once... Do that and every item in the car will be in Kansas before you can blink.

OCKLAWAHA

I would hope the police have better things to do with there time

I don't think its right for the City to finding new inventive ways of taxing it's citizens (i.e. traffic cameras, cig butts, dui, seat belt, etc)! Why not just make up a storm water fee or raise the millage rates? Uh, oh wait...

If it's sooo unsightly to look at butts while waiting at a light, there are a few options for you!  ;)
1. Dont look at the cigs
2. Run the red light
3. pick them up yourself (do you think its as bad of a poluttant as oil and gas?)

True, when conditions are right there is a fire threat but come on, in the city? Concrete is a great retardant.

The focus should be litter.  Butts would be included in that definition.  Why is the fine for littering only $100?  I have been in some states with VERY little litter that fine up to $1000 for littering.  Nearly every visitor that I have spoke with mentions the trash.  The state of Florida and Jacksonville ought to be ashamed of the trash along the roads, parking lots, trails, parks, playgrounds, etc. >:(

I think the only thing this poll shows is 85% of MJ are non-smokers

A cigarette butt is paper & cotton... not enriched uranium. A butt takes 3-6 months to decompose.

How about cracking down on the people who over fertilize their lawns, the massive business complex's that run their sprinklers in a down pour or people who blow their yard clippings down the storm drain and are killing our river.

If the State of Florida only has a $100 fine for littering, that's criminal. It should be increased to $500 and heavily enforced. My opinion on littering goes thusly: if someone over the age of 21 is caught doing it, they should be executed on the spot. Littering shows a disregard for the environment, no respect for other people's property including public property, no respect for other people, and no respect for themselves. The world doesn't need people who litter anymore than it needs murders, rapists, or pedophiles. I know it sounds extreme to lump litterbugs in there, but that's how I feel on the subject.

I will admit when I smoked I did just throw them out the window and thought nothing of it. However, even if they will decompose quickly, just look at the sides of roads at major interestctions, ciggarette butts are everywhere. The people throwing them out theirs windows outpaces the butts decomposing. Whatever way you reason with it, it is littering.

Quote1. Cigarette butt litter is the world’s greatest environmental litter problem

2. Globally, approximately 4.3 trillion cigarette butts are littered every year. Smokers in the USA account for over 250 billion cigarette butts, in the UK 200 tonnes of butts are discarded, and Australian smokers litter over 7 billion cigarette butts annually. In most Western countries cigarette butt litter accounts for around 50% of all litter.

3. Almost 1 in 3 cigarette butts end up as litter â€" see the diagram below from Nolan â€" ITU to understand where butts are littered and how they impact the environment

4. Cigarette butt litter dramatically increases where indoor smoking bans are implemented.

5. In Australia, NSW smokers throw away enough butts to fill 7 Olympic swimming pools. Up to 350,000 butts end up in Port Phillip Bay, Victoria and waterways every day

6. It can take up to 12 years for a cigarette butt to break down

7. Cigarette butts can leach chemicals such as cadmium, lead and arsenic into our marine environment within an hour of contact with water

8. Cigarette butts have been found in the stomachs of fish, whales, birds and other marine animals which leads to ingestion of hazardous chemicals and digestive blockages

9. Smokers in many countries can be fined for flicking a lit cigarette

10. And the final and most important thing to know about cigarette butt litter is: Only smokers can stop cigarette butt litter. We need to educate them that butts are litter, and provide a positive alternative to littering.

http://www.buttsout.net/litter_stats

Lunican you don't find buttout.net a little extreme?

QuoteCigarette butt litter is the world’s greatest environmental litter problem

QuoteIt can take up to 12 years for a cigarette butt to break down

If our greatest litter problem was material that took between 3 months and 12 years to decompose I would say we don't have much of a problem.

How many olympic size swimming pools could they fill with discarded Foster's cans in Austrailia? How long does aluminium take to decompose?

Well they said litter problem, not pollution problem... I dunno.

So cotton & paper are much worse that styrofoam, aluminum and plastics?

I'm not trying to say this is good for the environment but realistically 5 out of 7 of the Olympic swimming pools (full of butts) will be decomposed by April of the following year.

I'm sorry steven... is cellulose acetate worse for the environment than a beer can?

Quote from: stephendare on June 26, 2009, 12:22:10 PM
I don't know...
Would you wash off with a wash cloth that was dipped in cat pee first?

think about it.

cat urine does contain a substantial amount of amonia which is a powerful cleaning agent :)

Was that a personal attack?  ;D

Quote7. Cigarette butts can leach chemicals such as cadmium, lead and arsenic into our marine environment within an hour of contact with water

Beer cans do not.

Slowly drive down any roadway and count the number of beer cans (or whatever) you see and then count the cigarette butts.  Hell, just sit at the off ramp of I295 and San Jose and count the hundreds piled up by the dried out rain puddles.

It doesn't matter how long it takes them to decompose, they are hideous to look at, are a nusance to the storm drainage, and wastewater systems, and potentially harmful to the environment and wildlife.

$1,000 fine for litter.

Quote from: Charles Hunter on June 25, 2009, 10:45:14 PM
Fined is so polite - how about flogging?  Or being made to eat their own cigarette butts - and any others that may be on the ground near where they threw theirs.

The eating part might not be a bad idea...In all to drunk of a night, when I was 21, I did eat a cigarette and it was absolutely terrible.

I do smoke, but I make a point to not litter our world with my nasty habit.

http://quitsmoking.about.com/od/cigaretteingredients/a/ciglitter.htm

They don't decompose, that is the problem. I hope that now that they are becoming more and more expensive, people will not be able to smoke them.

My biggest complaint is that they are usually still LIT when the smoker tosses it out the car window.  I swear, one day at a traffic light I'm gonna pick it up, toss it back in their car and say "Oops!  You dropped this!"

 :D  i did that to a couple punks who threw out a plastic bottle.  They were really caught off guard and neither said a word!!!

The difference between a beer can and a cigarette is that when someone throws a cigarette out, no one thinks anything of it. If people threw beer cans (maybe coke cans would be better since it's legal to drink in a car) out of the window at every red light people would be outrage, taking down license plates, etc.

I don't think the debate should be which decomposes better, it should be why is it acceptable to litter, as long as your littering this item?

sanmarcomatt, I really hope that was a joke! Bad childhood with garbage cans? Come'on! Even if so, it's no excuse. As for taxing items because we expect them to turn in to trash on the road, I'm not up for paying for someone else's laziness. I already pay taxes to clean the streets, I shouldn't have to pay twice. Then they're going to tax CDR's because of piracy (like canada), no thanks.

If you weren't joking, sorry. I like your last idea best :D

Too bad the city has no money, I'd love to see them make a parody of the butts on the road. Instead of people throwing out cig butts, throw out aluminum cans. If you have 100 butts littering the road, just think what 100 cans would look like instead. People would be aghast. But the fact that littering is littering, just because its small does not take away from the importance of making it an issue. If I saw 100 cans at an intersection, I'd be snapping photos and sending it to the TU for picture of the day!

Stopping littering of bottles, cans and cigarette butts is really quite easy.  You just put a good deposit amount on each of them.  In states with bottle/can deposit laws, any thrown out on the road don't stay there long.

Just think, a 10 cent deposit on each cigarette filter and the roadsides would be lined with people waiting for a cigarette to be thrown from a window and your kids would raid your ashtrays to raise money.

Or we could just add a 10% tax to all "take-out" or "to-go" food with the revenue totally devoted to picking up litter on the roads.  Most of it seems to be fast food wrappings anyway.

This is interesting. Currently the results of the poll are:
Yes     - 39 (81.3%)
No    - 9 (18.8%)

And according to the American Lung Association:

QuoteIn 2006, an estimated 45.3 million, or 20.6% of adults (aged 18+) were current smokers.

http://www.lungusa.org/site/c.dvLUK9O0E/b.39853/ (http://www.lungusa.org/site/c.dvLUK9O0E/b.39853/)

Coincidence??

Good call, Core!   That means that all but 0.8% of smokers throw their cigarette butts out the window.  Suspicions confirmed!  LOL!

I have actually watched as someone stopped at a traffic light opened his car door and emptied his car ash tray onto the roadway.

What would be the effect of banning cigarette filters?

Quote from: Charles Hunter on June 25, 2009, 10:45:14 PM
Fined is so polite - how about flogging?  Or being made to eat their own cigarette butts - and any others that may be on the ground near where they threw theirs.

But, realistically, the police have more pressing matters.

WOW!  That one actually made me laugh out loud at my desk!

Basically the people who throw their buts out of their car windows are self serving a-holes who would rather everyone be inconvenienced by their litter than actually dealing with it themselves.  Cars are made with ashtrays.  Use them, drive your butts home and dump them in your own front yards.  They'll decompose . . . right?

If you feel that the butts are to disgusting to have in your car ashtray, why do you smoke and put them in your body?

"paper and cotton"????  ANd I suppose the product itself is just a dried-out leaf, not a slew of chemicals, right?  And the claims that the product causes cancer is just a load of hewy too??  Cigarette butts DO NOT biodegrade in the manner that some toilet paper left out in the rain does.  The butts are made of plastics (ever smoke TRU?  Guessing not.  How about Black-n-Milds??), as well as polyester (a type of plastic and man-made). THIS is why you see so many of them around all the time.  They pile and pile and never go away!  EVERYONE should be held accountable for their OWN litter.  There are products that smokers can carry with them to put out their cigs when walking around town rather than putting them out and leaving them on the pavement.  Cars are equipped with ashtrays...use them and empty them in your trash when you get home.  Make it part of regularly cleaning your car.  When you go to the car-wash, empty your ash tray.  Why is that so difficult???  And if you don't use your ashtray because you don't like the smell of the smoke in your car, why on earth would you think anyone elses wants to smell it when it's smoldering at a red-light and getting sucked into their AC intake??  Reckless, irresponsible, juvenile, and completely and utterly self-serving.

Could not have said it better myself, second_pancake. Hear Hear.

I agree too pancake.

I'm not anti-smoking... but I am against littering. Throw your garbage in the TRASH. Cigarette butts are no different.

I did vote no on the poll, only because I believe the punishment should be to have the lit cigarette butt shoved back into their gas tanks.