For years, New York city has become safer and more prosperous. However, littering continues to be an issue. The city still can’t figure out how to stop people from trashing streets.
After observation, I notice there are a few types of littering. When the bin is full, people continue to put garbage on top of it, and scatter trash around it.
When no bin is available, people randomly pile things up on sidewalks.
And the worst one, there is a bin, and the bin is not full, people trow things around anyway.
Around the world, there are countries with some effective approaches to this issue. Singapore enforces heavy fine for littering, even if it is just gum.
Buenos Aires keeps streets and sidewalks clean by securing a spot for small and bigger-size trash bin. People in the neighborhood thus know there is spot for garbage.
In Japan, they make trash can noticeable and hard to ignore.
Can we think of a fun solution to stop people from littering the street, starts from subway station? We see newly installed interactive kiosks and screens where you touch and get map and direction at some major stations.
Advertising company love their ads displaying on one of the screens. When people wait for the trains, they stand around and idle or hear music on earphone; things showing up on the screen is where the attention goes.
What if we can try, secure a same spot for trash bin, along with one of these screens? Instead of showing ads, what if we rotate and display gifs of someone famous to encourage people putting garbage in the bin, by applauding?
Some examples here —
Displaying images like these on a screen is meant to make people and pedestrians curious, stop, get a good laugh about it. There is a better chance for them to be aware the location of the bin, so they are willing to walk a few more steps to reach the bin. There is also a higher chance for them to pick garbage up if they miss.