Digby County couple concerned about dozens of alcohol containers found along highway

A couple in Concession, N.S., is sounding the alarm after their annual spring garbage pickup yielded dozens of alcoholic beverage containers along a one-kilometre stretch of highway.

Dave and Lisa Doucette collected three large garbage cans full of trash near their home on Secondary Division Road, which runs parallel to Highway 101, last Monday.

Within that trash, they also found 117 alcohol bottles and cans.

"It scares me, it really scares me to know that there are people driving in front of our house that are drinking and driving," Doucette told CBC Radio's Maritime Noon on Wednesday.

" … They're drinking a can of beer and when they're done, they just throw it out their window."

The couple cleaned up 117 alcoholic beverage containers that likely accumulated over a one-year period. (Dave Lisa Doucette/Facebook)

Doucette said they clean this stretch of highway every spring, so these containers would have accumulated over the last year alone.

Kathryn Bremner, the programs and development officer with DivertNS, agreed that 117 alcohol containers is a lot for a one-kilometre stretch of road, but she's not surprised.

The environmental agency conducted a roadside litter audit of 75 sites across Nova Scotia in 2021. It showed eight per cent of the litter collected was beverage containers, including alcohol bottles and cans. She said this was an increase from the last audit conducted in 2008.

"It's not the biggest category of items, but it was significant," she said.

She said the audit also broke down the top five identifiable brands that were found among litter. While Tim Hortons and McDonald's held the top spots, AB InBev, a large brewing company that produces popular beer brands Budweiser, Stella Artois and Corona, was No. 3.

"It's hard to say exactly how many liquor containers are being thrown out roadside, but there's definitely more than there should be, because there should be zero," Bremner said.

Bremner said any piece of litter within 50 kilometres of a shoreline is likely to land in the ocean, and in Nova Scotia, "that's pretty much everywhere."

"So anything that you throw on the ground, whether it's a cigarette butt or a piece of paper or plastic or an alcohol container, it will likely get into a waterway and have a huge impact on wildlife and our aquatic ecosystem," she said.

Bremner said people should be taking their bottles and cans to depots around the province.

"You know it's going to get recycled and you get money back in your pocket, which everybody can use, so it really logically does not make sense to throw it out the window when there is that option there."

Littering fines hard to enforce

Under Nova Scotia's Motor Vehicle Act, there is a $410 fine for littering from a vehicle on the highway.

RCMP Const. Dominic Laflamme said those fines can be hard to enforce because an officer needs to witness the action. He said people who see someone throwing litter from a vehicle can report it, but they must be able to identify the person who did it.

Laflamme said during this career as a police officer, he hasn't witnessed anyone throw an alcoholic beverage from a vehicle.

He's said it's concerning that dozens were picked up along a short stretch in Digby County.

"We obviously try to enforce as much as we can the impaired driving legislation because we know there's a lot of collisions every year caused by alcohol," he said.

"Everybody knows they shouldn't be drinking and driving, but there's always people that will risk it and unfortunately that causes a lot of problems on the roads ... [they could] hurt themselves or they could hurt somebody else."

He said detachments across the province have been conducting more checkpoints for impaired driving and more officers are being trained to detect alcohol and recreational cannabis.

He encouraged anyone who suspects someone is impaired while driving to call police to report it.

Doucette said she wants people to do the right thing and stop littering.

"I hope people start being more aware and not litter on the side of the roads or anywhere really. Wait till you get home."

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