During a recent trip up Roberts Mill Road in Falling Water, I was pleased to see the myriad of wildflowers starting their course of blooms; Virginia Bluebells, Trillium and Buckeye are some of the first of our native wildflowers to greet the motorists who use this narrow, winding mountain trail. Unfortunately the early bloom of the Tennessee litterbug has overtaken the natural beauty of this area with copious amounts of garbage which is flung out of vehicles to the point where the view is destroyed by the filth of others.
This area is a no-man’s land sitting in Hamilton County but not within a municipal area. Who should be contacted to see that this area is picked up? No one seems to have an answer.
I request that the high sheriff of Hamilton County utilize the seemingly at rest workforce, available within the ranks of those DUI offenders, to help pay their debt to society by picking this up on a regular basis. The gates could be closed for the few hours it would take to send a crew to walk down the mountain with a large stash of garbage bags and collect the garbage that is such a poor reflection on the citizens of this county.
I will add that the potential inconvenience of the road closure should be felt by all who use this road regularly, in an effort to remind people that littering is a crime and that all citizens are the victims. Perhaps if the perpetrators are made to drive around the other side of the mountain for a while then they will think again about throwing their filth and waste out their car window for all of us to have to see.
Bring back the “Tennessee Trash” ad campaigns from the 70s so a whole new generation of trashy people can be reminded of the affects of their poor choices.
Carter Parham