by TRC_Admin | Aug 31, 2019 | Litter, Nature
Photo: WPTV
“The International Coastal Cleanup is the world’s largest, one-day volunteer effort to clean up the marine environment. Every September, volunteers from over 100 countries descend on local beaches, rivers, lakes and canals to show their commitment to cleaner waterways…”
Cleanup locations in Palm Beach County are included in this article and this popular activity will be held along beaches and waterways throughout our state.
— WPTV
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by TRC_Admin | Feb 11, 2019 | Codes, Controversial, Litter
Photo: WJHG.com News 7
“Empty beach chairs won’t occupy large swaths of the prime Walton County coastline next tourist season if the South Walton Community Council has its way.
The council, represented at Tuesday’s County Commission by John Reichenbach, wants to see some pretty drastic changes to the way beach vendors conduct business.
“We think it’s critical we get behind a managed beach vendor program,” Reichenbach told commissioners.
Among the changes proposed by the Community Council is a regulation that would “eliminate ghost chairs” by requiring vendors to set up their chairs only after a beach-going customers arrive and remove it when they leave.
Although he came to the meeting prepared for discussion, Reichenbach will have to wait until next year for a public hearing on beach code revision recommendations.
Before he even stood to speak, commissioners voted to postpone any discussion Tuesday and schedule a forum for Jan. 9 to debate what will likely be a long series of beach management proposals…
Walton County has heard complaints for years about vendors taking up too much beach space by setting up chairs that nobody sits in. They’ve also heard that vendors are too aggressive or that they set up dozens of chairs in prime locations along the water early in the morning before locals and visitors can claim a spot.
Like many other things along the beaches of South Walton, the vendor issues were exacerbated this year by the implementation of House Bill 631, which led to squabbling over customary use of the beach and private property rights.
Along with its call to eliminate ghost chairs, the South Walton Community Council also recommended that the number of beach vendor permits be limited and that a code enforcement officer or paid beach monitor be employed to watch for ordinance violations.”
— Tom Mclaughlin, NWF Daily News
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Read additional WJFG article on possible regulations
by TRC_Admin | Feb 11, 2019 | Bikes, Litter, Shared Scooters Bikes Etc
Photo: Robyn Beck/AFP/Getty Images in Forbes
by TRC_Admin | Feb 11, 2019 | Bikes, Litter, Shared Scooters Bikes Etc
Photo: The Regulatory Review
“Cities across the country have been invaded by flocks of Birds. But these Birds do not have wings—they have wheels.
Bird is the largest of several electric scooter share companies operating in cities worldwide. Scooter users download an app to locate and unlock the motorized scooters, then rent them by the minute. The scooters are dockless and tracked by GPS, so users can park them anywhere at the end of a ride instead of returning them to a designated location.
In theory, these programs are similar to bike shares like Indego, Divvy, and CitiBike, which offer short-term bicycle rentals within certain cities. But the sudden rollout of motorized scooters on city sidewalks—sometimes without warning—has demanded rapid regulatory responses from city officials.
In Los Angeles, where Bird unexpectedly launched last fall, many residents eagerly adopted motorized scooters as a short-distance transportation option. But the city government also received immediate complaints.
According to scooter share companies, users are supposed to ride scooters in bike lanes and park them near bike racks. But in practice, riders often zoom along sidewalks. Users also park scooters where they block pedestrian traffic, frustrating other residents.
Los Angeles issued a cease-and-desist letter to Bird in June 2018, demanding it to ‘remove any and all vehicles’ from the city. But the letter also stated that the city had a ‘pending regulatory process for permitting scooters’ which, if adopted, would allow Bird—and similar companies such as Lime and Spin—to operate scooter shares legally.
Since then, Los Angeles City Council approved a city-wide dockless vehicle pilot program. The program invited Bird and other companies to establish scooter shares by following new rules about permitting, parking, and maintenance. The regulations include a requirement for companies to have a 24-hour contact person available for ’emergency removals’ of scooters.
Other cities have also regulated scooters, including Washington, D.C. The city began a formal pilot program for dockless vehicles last year to test the popularity of scooter and bike shares. According to Washington’s Department of Transportation, the program logged more than 625,000 rides since its start date through June 2018.
Due to the high demand for dockless scooter and bike sharing, Washington extended its pilot program to the end of 2018 and plans to launch a new city-wide permitting process in 2019…
Electric scooters…are more popular and affordable than the Segway. In most cities, Bird charges a dollar to unlock a scooter and only 15 cents per minute of riding. This makes scooters available to users who cannot or do not want to pay hundreds of dollars to purchase their own scooter. The widespread popularity of shared electric scooters has made calls for their regulation far more pressing than those raised by Segway.
Despite the scooter wave that has swept through cities worldwide, one major city has held out—New York City. This is in part because the state of New York completely prohibits the use of motorized scooters, defined as ‘a device with a motor attached and a handlebar for a standing rider.’
Scooter companies have so far been unwilling to launch in New York City. But growing demand for affordable, convenient transportation—and the potential to alleviate automobile traffic and parking challenges—has inspired city officials to pave the path for scooters. Two New York City Council members, Rafael L. Espinal Jr. and Ydanis Rodriguez, introduced a package of legislation that would allow electric scooter shares in the city…”
— Kate Mancuso,The Regulatory Review
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by TRC_Admin | Aug 1, 2018 | Litter, Nature
Photo: Florida Trend
“…In one recent study, I worked with other researchers to estimate increased travel and time expenditures that people incurred to avoid trash and debris on 31 Southern California beaches. No one wants to go to a beach littered with hypodermic needles, plastic bottles and discarded fishing nets. But cleaning up marine debris is expensive, and it is hard for communities to recover the costs, particularly for public beaches with open access. Understanding the value of cleaner beaches can help build support for funding trash collection.
To measure the amount of debris, we hired workers to walk the beaches tallying quantities of trash. Then we surveyed Southern California residents about how often and where they went to the beach, which enabled us to correlate numbers of visitors at each beach with quantities of debris. Finally, using travel time and expenses for each visitor to visit each beach, we modeled the relationship between where they chose to go to the beach, how much they spent to get there, and the cleanliness of the beach.
Using this model, we found that visitors to these beaches would be willing to incur $12.91 in additional costs per trip if each of the beaches had 25 percent less debris. This translated into a total willingness to pay $29.5 million for action to reduce marine debris by 25 percent on these beaches…”
— Timothy Haab, The Conversation, Florida Trend
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by TRC_Admin | Aug 1, 2018 | Legal, Litter, Trash
Photo: NWF Daily News
“…Walton County is notifying coastal private property owners that its crews will no longer collect garbage from the beaches at their homes or condominiums.
County Attorney Sidney Noyes told county commissioners Tuesday that enough owners had refused to back off previous requests to keep county vehicles off their land to warrant the decision to halt all garbage collections.
‘Unfortunately, even though some of these individual private property owners have rescinded their requests, others are not willing to, so it looks like we will not be able to continue the garbage collection service on private property,’ Noyes told the board.
Noyes said letters would be sent out Tuesday or Wednesday to inform all owners that as of Aug. 13 they would be responsible for picking up their own beach trash, something Walton’s Tourist Development Council has done for years…
The county’s move is the latest fallout from the July 1 implementation of a new state law. HB 631 wiped out Walton County’s customary use ordinance and gave private beachfront owners the ability to post no trespassing signs on their property and prevent people from accessing dry sand areas there…
Sheriff Michael Adkinson, whose deputies have been called upon regularly since July 1 to mediate property disputes on local beaches, has said consistently his deputies are not going to charge anyone on the beach with criminal trespass.
Nonetheless, Commission Chairman Bill Chapman argued at Tuesday’s meeting that the county couldn’t risk collecting trash on private property for fear an arrest would result.
‘I don’t want to see legal action taken, criminally, by our guys going up and down there and picking up the trash,’ Chapman said. ‘I don’t want guys driving being subjected to arrest by the sheriff because we’ve violated a demand letter.’
..Litigation seems to be on the horizon. Attorney and customary use advocate Steve Uhlfelder warned commissioners Tuesday that by refusing garbage collection the private property owners were strengthening an argument against customary use. He urged them to continue sending crews to pick up trash in defiance of the no trespassing warnings.
‘Don’t go along with it. Go pick up the trash and maintain the beaches, otherwise you will be giving up some legal arguments,’ Uhlfelder said. “I don’t think you should be dictated to’…”
— Tom McLaughlin, nwfDailyNews.com
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