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Citizen complaint of the day: Letter carriers need to stop dropping rubber bands all over Beacon Hill
By adamg on Sat, 02/29/2020 - 12:58pm
An exasperated citizen files a 311 complaint about rubber bands strewn all along West Cedar Street:
Please ask the USPS postal carriers not to discard rubber bands on the sidewalk. They are up and down both sides of our street. Residents have to clean them up.
Earlier:
Citizen complaint of the day: An elastic situation that's out of hand on Beacon Street
Neighborhoods:
Free tagging:
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Comments
I pick these up off my steps
I pick these up off my steps every day. I got so tired of it I started hanging them on a hook at my mailbox so the mail carrier could see just how much he was littering. He stopped doing it.
Thought they were called
Thought they were called elastics?
Not...
... here.
You are correct. Around here
You are correct. Around here they are called elastics.
USPS Rubber Bands
I'm a USPS letter carrier and I call them 'Postal Jewelry'. When I pull them off, I place them on my wrists until I return to the Post Office. We reuse them to band the next day's mail. Occasionally, there's a few that may get lost along the way. I personally am more concerned about getting the mail to the proper recipients and keeping it from being soaked from the rain. Most have no idea what this job requires.
Really?
First world problems...
dogs eat them
not to mention birds
and in enough quantity they can clog drains causing property damage
personally, i think asking a Federal worker not to litter hardly makes someone a '1st World' whiner
Not all carriers a "littering
Not all carriers a "littering." I guess none of you have actually been carriers. Every bundle of magazines, for every relay, are rubber banded. You don't think after putting them back in your bag, then pulling out parcels, some won't make their way out here and there? Before I started being organized with my rubber bands, I was bringing them home and all kinds of stuff. I agree carriers shouldn't be sloppy and do this on purpose, but don't think everybody does. It happens. I'm sure you are all experts, that never make mistakes, but some of us are still human, and do. I pick them up when I see them, whether I dropped them or not. Some people are slobs, and don't care about much bo matter where you work. I'm sure you or somebody you know is.
"NOT ALL LETTERCARRIERS!"
Nowhere did anyone accuse all postal workers.
And maybe switch to decaf.
Hold my satchel real quick
Just became a cca, and it’s not on purpose if some of us drop elastics, including myself , for the most part it’s usually an accident and we don’t realize, that guy could have been a real tool or it was an honest accident, sheesh
Seriously, some people have
Seriously, some people have too much time on their hands. "oh no, clutch my pearls is that another rubber band - this just won't do".
So you’re cool with littering
So you’re cool with littering. Got it.
I'm not cool with littering
I'm not cool with littering one bit.
But you’re also not cool with
But you’re also not cool with asking people not to litter.
You two..
... have too much time on your hands.
Really?
When a dog or cat eats them and requires emergency care (or dies from intestinal obstruction), it's an expensive, unnecessary problem.
People routinely throwing things on the ground instead of recycling or disposing of them properly is littering, a legitimate issue if you give a damn about where you live.
News flash, most letter
News flash, most letter carriers aren't throwing them on the ground on purpose. Just because you assume the worst in people doesn't make it true. Try handling hundreds of rubber bands each day, discarding them in a bag or pocket then when you reach in to grab something else out like say a scanner or more mail, keys, etc. multiple rubber bands get dragged out with it. If you're not constantly looking at the ground you aren't going to even notice them fall out. Organization is key and having one spot designated for discarding rubber bands would help, but it's hard to stay organized while delivering mail to around 700 mailboxes in a matter of hours.
The whiner
Needs to get a life. Talk about 1st world problems.
The rubber produced..
.. to replace wantonly discarded rubber bands is an all world problem.
Video
Thanks for including the video. Its good to remember that these small inexpensive items have a whole production process which is being wasted by not reusing them. Throwing them on the sidewalk is not just making it look dirty, risking the health of wildlife, gumming up storm drains and waterways, it is also wasting resources and money.
Rubber band production
Rubber band production is very cool! "How it's made" is my go to show for these types of videos.
PO needs better rubber bands
Those things get left all over my front stairs in East Boston too. I just pick them up and reuse them. They're not really that great though. Kind of inflexible and not very stretchy at all. You'd think the post office would use better rubber bands!
But why
I mean, if they're going to throw them on the ground after one use, why spend extra on the good ones?
Rubberbands
Would you like to contribute to a fund to help the post office pay for better rubber bands? How about the whiner start putting the rubberbands around a more stunning night to drop then on their property? Or pictures of animals intestines that have been obstructed by the rubbers. Or, stop ordering things so the carrier doesn't have to pull anything out of their limited space bag and thus rubberbands that might be clinging to said pkg. Carriers are on a time restricted job and face consequences when not on time. Picking up bands that come out of bag or wherever will cost then time they don't have. Take your complaint higher up and give the carrier a break.
Rubber bands
Just ask the carrier be careful with them.They break .Since someone posted this management knee jerk reaction will be to take them away from use.So that means letters sorted on street more later delivery times.Is it really worth doing this here. WHAT you ask for you May get it. If i were this carrier i put 20 rubber bands on this person mail everyday.
Bay Village used to have issues with elastics on sidewalks
But they all had reservoir tips...
From a letter carrier
It's true, the rubber bands are easy to drop along the route. They're also very easy to pick up. Missing one here and there is human, leaving them up and down a sidewalk it's just ignorant. BTW, the rubber bands we use are made of a different material than the ones you are used to, which is why they don't stretch as well. They are designed to degrade quickly when exposed to sunlight. The p.o uses this type to help protect environment.
You hate rubber bands? So do
You hate rubber bands? So do we. Why are there rubber bands in your neighborhood? Have we considered the reason why they are used??? It's to hold massive amounts of catalogs together. Do you hate catalogs?? So do we. This rubber band situation is a dual problem. Internet ordering= multiple catalogs=rubber bands to keep them contained....if you're seeing one rubber band per house in a 400 house subdivision, you have a crap carrier. Otherwise, let's try to think perspective
The blue ones are Elastic Band
The blue ones are used by the company that delivers the free papers. The large ones are USPS. So the 311 identifies only half the perpetrators. I live on Beacon Hill, but I spend most of my sidewalk clean up time on empty nips or other liquor bottles and the occasional human dump.