shocking

[mikeb]

Somehow, people need to be persuaded to bring less stuff. If you can carry it in easily, you can carry it out easily.

All I can think of is something to that effect in the Fine Guide: "Remember that everything you bring, and everything you buy, you'll have to carry back out, so pack light".

Edited July 12, 2009 by mikeb

[ukslim]

Ah yes, of course ... you mean saying things like "travel light", "don't bring unnecessary stuff with you", "don't bring gazebos", "don't bring anything that you're not prepared to take home with you" and "Love the Farm, Leave no Trace" and all the things already publicised kinda like that

[Sam Crawley]

One thing that occurs to me is that people seem willing to bring huge loads of stuff to the festival, meaning they struggle in laden with lots of huge bags, many making multiple trips back to their car to get more stuff. People arrive early on Wednesday and go back to their car to fetch more crap throughout the day.

[mikeb]

Wait a minute...

I know whose fault this is..

Edited July 12, 2009 by mikeb

[Storm_NL]

Yaaaaay, time to grab those pitchforks and flares chaps as I feel a coming on ! Exxxxxcellent, you just can't beat a good old fashioned witch hunt can ya

But seriously, it's not really down to how much stuff you actually bring in reality at all it's simply down to taking personal responsibility for it. I bring way too much stuff in general even though I always come by train but it all goes home with me no matter how much it nearly killed me personally humping it all the way from home to the site and how much I'm not looking forward to the return journey ! It's not difficult, you just need to be prepared to do it rather than looking for the easy answer and making your cr@p someone else's problem.

[dunlop852]

Yes people shouldn't leave any rubbish behind, but it is sadly impossible to stop. No reason to stop trying though!!!

From my experience of leaving any festival well after the masses have they all look like that. I don't understand why many Glasto goers seem to believe that the Glasto land is any different to any other landowner allowing a festival to take place. Do Glasto goers have the same reaction when they see the aftermath of Leeds Festival which is held in the grounds of a stately home?

Should profit not be mentioned? If a land owner is disgusted at what any event does to their land, stop the event. The fact is that any money the land owner makes is obvioulsy enough compensation for them to tolerate the aftermath, including the clean up bill/operation.

just to add, i live in the country so have more than enough experience with tourists coming from the city, for the day, and destroying our park and other public areas. Sadly we don't have any direct income from the tourists to these public spaces so all clear must be done by the owner, the streched county council.

Edited July 12, 2009 by dunlop852

[Elstra]

I had images of something like this:

[Rufus Gwertigan]

hehehe, quite inadvertently, however, you're right!

[redmuz]

i realise how unworkable and, really, undesirable this suggestion is but...allocate a designated pitch with ticket sales and then fine the asses off the people who leave this sort of a mess!!

jesus. trashing your 50 quid camping pack, leaving your litter lying around and leaving a bucket full of sh!t in a tent is not just another part of your 'festival experience'!!!!

gah.

i'm off to put my recycling out.

Edited July 12, 2009 by redmuz

[cejx]

Ah yes, of course ... you mean saying things like "travel light", "don't bring unnecessary stuff with you", "don't bring gazebos", "don't bring anything that you're not prepared to take home with you" and "Love the Farm, Leave no Trace" and all the things already publicised kinda like that. Just some of the various messages, advice and requests given on the Glasto site and in the Fine Guide etc.

Unfortunately, what's really needed is a "lazy, selfish, inconsiderate and anti-social tw@t" detector at all the gates, preferably also connected to a few million volts so therefore preventing such peeps from coming on site and bringing all their totally unnecessary cr@p with them No amount of good advice and very reasonable requests appears to have any real effect at all does it

Reducing the general admission ticket price but seriously increasing the car parking ticket price would be a good move IMHO to deter vehicles unless they were filled with a reasonable amount of peeps. For instance £10 off tickets but £50 to park would have no nett effect if the car was filled with passengers but it might just deter the 1 person in 1 vehicle brigade and promote public transport as the more sensible and appropriate option. Difficult to bring way too much unnecessary stuff with you on the train and so on but dead easy if you have a big car and no passengers. Public transport issues would need to be addressed first of course but a lot of the existing problems would be very much reduced with fewer cars trying to get to the site. Still wouldn't solve the problem tho I don't think but it may help.

[beergut100]

You may remember during the World Cup on Wednesday, some tw*t ran on the field and kicked the ball out. Well, we were stood near those c**ts and they were dropping litter, cans, boxes, all sorts all around them. They were a mixed group of about 7 or 8 people, with about half a brain cell between them. I mention this because one of the excuses that have been put forward for people littering was that the bins were full; but this was 4pm on the Wednesday and all the bins were completely empty. No matter what you do to raise awareness of issues, in a crowd of 170,000, many bastards will never give a shit.

They were also talking about how if anyone set up in their camp, they'd twat them (they must have roped off an area)

On the plus side, we noticed that one of them was burning badly, so, though we had suncream, we let the c**t fry!

Edited July 12, 2009 by beergut100

[cejx]

Wait a minute...

I know whose fault this is..

LusciousLucy!!!

Before the days of the /index.php?showtopic=80617&hl=lusciouslucy+packing+list">UberUberUber packing list, people used to grab a bag, shove in a light jacket, couple of tinnies and your ticket and head off. Now thanks to Lucy people shuttle back and forth with wheelbarrows bringing in their disposable kitchen sinks.

So Lucy, we need a new uberlist, limited to three items, ticket, wellies and one discretionary item which must be presented when leaving the site on Monday, with tazors and snipers at the ready if this item has been lost or stolen during the fest.

Simples!

[amfy]

It has sadly always been like this in terms of rubbish, but the leaving behind of camping equipment has increased as it has got cheaper.

I know that I have always gone to sleep on Sunday night not wanting to leave the next day, and thinking I will take my time, maybe have one last stroll around the site etc when I get up.

Then I wake up on Monday morning and look out at a disgusting bombsite and just want to go home!

It is about people's attitudes rather than the cheapness in itself though. I have had £40 tents that have done a half a dozen festivals and then been passed on to others as I outgrew them. (Well - got too creaky to crawl in and out of them!)

It is fair to say though, that the pictures show what is left, not what is picked up. If you look closely across the fields, alot of what looks "strewn" is actually bagged up. OK - it could've got as far as a rubbish point, but not a bad try for most on a knackered Monday morning. It is sad to see it like that, but lets not run away with the idea that this is the norm - most make some kind of effort - even Rockstar bagged his rubbish up!

Leaving perfectly good camping equipment is wasteful. Leaving rubbish all over the place instead of a bin is just plain rude. It makes me sad because Glastonbury does get an environmental message to me, and I don't know how people don't get it.

It was Glastonbury that started my daily battle with shops NOT to have a carrier bag by giving me a bag for life that I was so proud to carry! It seemed saddest of all to see those very bags left on one rubbish tip!

[ukslim]

I'd never read that. A harmonica? I'm aware that this isn't a glasters friendly comment, but I really would ram that where the sun don't shine if some f**ker started playing that next to me!

Anyway, back to rubbish. carry a tent, a rollmat, and sleeping bag, a torch, some cash, some clothes and a ticket. job done. take the lot back to the car afterwards.

[mikeb]

ok... a plan, but this may be controversial, but hows about no pass out. Once you're in you're in. Thus, can only bring what you can carry. granted sack trolleys and all that bollocks will be used, but it means that there can only be one trip to the car. Unfort, it cuts down on the 200 cans of stella folk bring, but I guess they'd just have to struggle in with it!

[Blaze]

That there will allways be a heap of litter left after every festival, no matter how much people are pressured to tidy up after them. Everyones there to have fun and if some people dont want to bother tidying up then let them, if you tidyed up your own pitch then why are you worrying about what other people done?

Simple as, no point bitching about it.

Just wait untill you see the aftermath for T in the Park and be greatfull that there are a few more considerate folk at Glastonbury.

[emmmmma]

That video is really upsetting. I'm seriously shocked by what is left when everyone has gone home. It is truly disgusting. I can't believe people can afford to leave all the camping gear behind when they go. How spoilt. Some of those camp sites had chairs, airbeds and tents plus whatever else was left inside the tent that we couldn't see. How could you possibly justify leaving all that behind? I really don't think I could do it.

[Jules007]

Thought there was meant to be a recession on?!

I can honestly say i took Everything back with me and cleared all my rubbish ( even down to the little plastic straw covers on small juice cartons)

How do people justify the waste? must have too much money.

[grumpyhack]

I'm really glad that this discussion has been started and that some people are shocked.

I was banging on about litter before Glasto because I've worked at some other festivals doing after-event litter picks and have experienced at first hand the crap that gets left (literally in some cases).

The sad reality is that a fair number of people at festivals turn into selfish piss heads. Think how many posts were there on this forum pre-Glasto about how much booze people could take in and whether police would be searching for drugs at motorway services.

I don't want to be holier than thou but I've taken the same tent and equipment to over 20 festivals now. Everything I take by way of equipment goes home. It's then washed, checked and repaired ready for the next one.

We leave nothing behind in our camp area and do a fingertip check for pegs and other rubbish. I won't drop a fag end but keep all the butts for the bin.

It's not rocket science just plain courtesy.

At one other festival I work at the post-festival site fingertip search by the litter pickers has to be so thorough that not a single fag end or piece of silly string or whatever can be left as the site has to be used the rest of the year as a Caravan Club site where the punters expect a spotless site.

One suggestion I have is that there should be a 20 minute period set aside each day for all the festival goers to do a mass litterpick of their area. But whether it would get many particpants I don't know.

Interestingly, I know that Michael Eavis has commissioned a study on the carbon footprint of Glastonbury which will make interesting reading.

[Storm_NL]

One suggestion I have is that there should be a 20 minute period set aside each day for all the festival goers to do a mass litterpick of their area. But whether it would get many particpants I don't know.

[cejx]

I also thought of that but quickly came to the conclusion that it was being more than a tad unreasonable. Just think of families for starters - even with 2 or more adults, carrying everything in 1 trip if you also have several kids with you is unlikely to be a realistic proposition. And of course there are no doubt some peeps who bring absolutely shedloads of stuff in their car(s) but *DO* always take every last bit of it home with them as well.

As always, the big problem with extra rules, bans or restrictions (be it on amount of stuff, tent size, flags, chairs, gazebos or whatever) is that it definitely has a negative effect on those who do want to bring such things but who are considerate and don't take the pi$$ in one way or another without necessarily having any positive effect at all. I mean even banning private vehicles completely and forcing everyone to use public transport wouldn't work totally in reality would it ? Because sadly, there would always be the same kinda peeps who leave stuff now deciding that they'd rather buy more stuff for next time (and almost certainly leaving anything broken or past it's prime) as opposed to wasting time/effort, getting wet or generally having the hassle of packing up and humping a load of cheap gear home with them. It might well reduce the problem but it certainly wont remove it completely and it could perhaps even lead to more people abandoning stuff rather than less.

I don't know what the solution is and I doubt there is one TBH other than somehow trying to educate peeps accordingly with regard to being considerate and responsible in general ... and there's the *real* problem. Some peeps just don't want to know, wont ever listen and couldn't care less about anything other than themselves unfortunately. There's not a great deal anyone can do to 'fix' that problem is there.

[sifi]

I think people take far too much. We used to, but a last year we decided to go minimal - like we used to when we first went.

I also don't understand why people can't take some stuff back to the car before they actually leave. I normally take a load back to the car whilst my other half takes down the tent.

[mott the hoople]

Not related to this thread (though I agree with you). I hear you have reformed, will you be playing next year?

[amfy]

We take loads of stuff but it's always lighter coming out because we've drunk the alcohol and used all the wet ones!!!

Used to be happy with a sleeping bag and a rollmat when i was younger but I need a bit more comfort now. I wouldn't be happy with any rules being brought in to limit what we take.

We take all our stuff back with us so why should we suffer for people who are too lazy to do the same?

[mott the hoople]

Not related to this thread (though I agree with you). I hear you have reformed, will you be playing next year?