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Cigarette bins removed after thieves use crow bars to steal butts
Wednesday 13th October 2010, 11:30AM BST.
How the bins were launched
Cigarette bins installed in Wolverhampton as part of an £11,000 litter campaign have been removed – because people were using crow bars to rip them open and steal the butts from inside.
Council bosses today revealed there had been daily attacks on the city’s 46 bins, which also collect chewing gum and cost taxpayers £75 to repair each time they are damaged.
The so-called Smart Bins were installed on lampposts in the city centre in autumn 2007, including Dudley Street, as part of a campaign to stop smokers littering the streets with discarded cigarette ends.
They also encouraged people to stop dropping gum on the floor.
But council chiefs said it had become “uneconomical” to keep them in light of the daily attacks as scavengers were prising them apart to steal tobacco dropped inside.
Steve Woodward, head of Wolverhampton City Council’s street scene services, said: “We have had a real problem with people breaking into the smart bins, using considerable force and we assume a crow bar or similar, to get at the discarded cigarettes inside.
“The police were informed. It became almost a daily occurrence and because it costs £75 a time of taxpayers’ money to replace the broken doors, it has simply become uneconomical to continue once our stock of spare parts had run out.
“We weren’t prepared to order new parts for exactly the same thing to happen again. Therefore we have taken the reluctant decision to remove the smart bins.”
He said that the smart bins would be kept in the council stores with the possibility of them being relocated elsewhere in the city if funds ever became available.
It costs the city council around £3 million a year to clear up 4,000 tons of litter and fly-tipped rubbish.
Council spokesman Tim Clark said: “We urge smokers to carry their own container such as a metal sweet tin or cigarette pouch so they can stub out their cigarettes and keep until they are near a bin.”
He warned that fixed £50 fines would be handed out to anybody caught dropping cigarettes on the streets.
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What a fantastic place Wolverhampton is…. about time they nuked the place
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And they wonder why everyone calls them Dingles.
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I assume you live in Birmingham or Sandwell, Wolverhampton is a palace compared to either of these mate.
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I find it hard to believe what lenghts people will go to for a smoke, I have noticed many cigarette bins broken and thought it was just mindless vandalism, but it appears to be people despereate to get a nicotine fix.
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Am I stupid??? But why steal butts?
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What I don’t get is why don’t they just put an openable door on the bin so those that want to discard their butts are able to whilst those that need free tobacco can help themselves. A sort of nicotine recycling scheme…
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nuke wolvo?
i just left for Canada…..
where winter is the best 9 months of the year
and its way better than wolvo.
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A town may look great in nice sunlight.
As soon as you add people….its goes downhill.
Shame about the bins…you do wonder at the mentality of these yobs!!!
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What about the towns in France..Spain..Switzerland? They’re filled with people and yet we don’t see the same kind of yobbish element. Rob, I don’t know what’s wrong with some people here..it seems we are unique when it comes to sinking to a new cultural low. I recently came back through this region from London on a bus, and the moment we entered the Sandwell border the problems started. No wonder this place is never on many a tourist map.
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Unbelieveable! These people must be really desperate…… or could it be tramps?
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why dont they just alter the bins so if some scrubber wants to steal stuff out of them they can without damaging the bin.
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how sad can life get!
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Do they have the same problem with the chewing gum bins?
And why have i never had my butt pinched?
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they probably use the gum to freshen their breath after the stolen butts theyve just smoked..how low will some people sink, unbelievable
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do us all a favour and ban smoking in all public places
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pete you are a fool it is allready banned in all public places
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Think he meant in public places as in out doors !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1
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Sam, you are a bigger fool. It isn’t- it’s banned in all enclosed public places.
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No it’s not! Just enclosed public or work places!
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Or alternativly why not ban drinking, it causes much more problems than smoking.
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John, have you never heard about street crime elsewhere? I was on holiday in Cordoba, a beautiful Spanish city with an ancient mosque and alcazar. We were walking down a street when two kids on a moped went by and tried to grab my friend’s bag. Similarly Barcelona had a terrible reputation for muggings.
I really don’t know what can be done to restore Wolverhampton’s reputation. Sadly given that one of the city’s major employers is the council, the only way is down for a few years. Too many sink estates, no jobs – anyone who can gets out at the first opportunity.
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Why are we providing bins so smokers can deposit there butts anyway. They choose to smoke so they need to deal with what they are going to do with the waste. Same goes for chewers. If littering is a problem then just get more wardens and collect fines off those littering to pay for that.
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why not go the whole way no bins at all god you are so perfect
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well if you put more wordens out you talking an extra 20 grand a year thats to kit the perosn out and all insurence training etc.
and the bins cost 75 quid to replace and all of them cost 11 grand so realy you can buy nearly twice please read the artical before replying.
allso if they paid a little extra they could have 2/half inch thick steal case for the box waight a little heavyer but will be tamper proof with a good lock
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ay wolves not to good with the spelling.lol
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The original idea of these bins was right. It just needs someone to redesign them so that it deters these rather sad people from wanting the butts. Why not put some chemical in the bottom of the bin which spoils the tobacco.
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– I’m very lucky to live in Florida, originally from the Black Country One massive difference between most of the civilized towns and cities in the world and the grey misery of the UK is the prevalence of litter and such disrespect for the environment and its people. It Education in the home and school is always a good starting point, but ultimately we have to get tough, I showed some folk I work with this article and the war monument that was sadly spoiled by some low life – they were not only appalled but did not believe that these type of people existed in England, anyone ever watch “the book of Eli’.
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I am shocked! I cannot believe that people would go these lentghs for a few puffs of someones disgarded butt end. How vile can you get?
Wolvo went to the dogs years ago. Yobs, layabouts and dole dossers hanging around all day. Not a nice or safe place to go at all.
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Give the smokers a break, price of cigarettes these days – who can blame these money conscious people, isn’t it a form of recycling?
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Why waste money on these stupid bins when it’s cheaper to throw them on the floor and also keeps somebody in a job….Or stub it out on somebodys car..well it is Wolverhampton Bronx
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Cant wait for this new goverment to sack all none jobs. If the population of London smoked and then dropped a butt on friday in Wolvo they would be all gone sunday. where, no one knows. Me thinks its time for all them tax taxers to get in the real world and earn a propper wage. There is going to be a few shocks in the next couple of years for those that think our country owes them a living.
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Interesting comment but wait until these jobs go, no more money spent in the shops, no more need for private firms to produce goods, more jobs in private industry to follow, just like the eighties all over again only this time the fast food places and supermarkets have already been built and staffed.
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people choose to smoke i smoke so what chuck it on the floor keep road sweepers in a job (I WORK FOR THE COUNCIL) but as for people slating wolves if you dont like it go live in a really skanky place called sandwell i agree people shud just get rid of the bins saving on tax payers money as for saying it aint on the tourist list why is it that its been voted 1 of the best places for nightlife so perhaps its all the people who knock wolves dont have a life so get over yourselfs
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What this illustrates is that the city has a massive drugs problem and the lengths that those adicts will got to get free tobbaco with their next fix.
The idiots who are doing this are the same drunks and substance abusers who used to loiter in St Peter’s Gardens.
They’re the same ones begging in doorways in search of cash from punters for their next fix to get off their faces.
Came out of Weatherspoons a few weeks ago to find some low life trying to get cig butts out from between the cobbles in the doorway.
Don’t blame the council for doing away with the bins. Why keep pumping money into the bins just for them to get wrecked?
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Wolves seems to be home to a right bunch of skanks.
From the drunks at the bus stop on Lichfield Street (outside the offy so the don’t have to walk too far) to the beggars who regularly park by the Nationwide cash machine outside KFC, Wolves has them all.
Every time I go out, I see at least one trampy looking type picking fag butts off the pavement, looking for spare change in the pay phones or wandering round with a can of strong brew trying to look like he/she’s interested in the shops.
With the boarded up shops, the derelict land and these skeezers adding to the general air of decay I really get depressed walking round.
Whatever substance abuse programme they’re on – it’s not working
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errrm wouldnt the sensible thing to do would be to leave the bins unlocked then if the tramps wanted to steal the butts they could and the counci workers wouldnt have to empty them so often or carry around the key to unlock them……I don’t condone these tramps pinching the tobacco but at the end of the day it’s only rubbish isn’t it iI don’t see why these bins need to be locked??????
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Mmmm, regardless of where the problem is the result is the same. The real problem is with the councils, they have overpaid shirts and ties sitting in air conditioned offices to solve problems they have no idea about in the first place. If the councils employed real ‘down to earth’ people who live in the boroughs and see the problems first hand problem solving would probably be more effective and cheaper. Its only Wolverhampton that being picked out this week, next week it will be some other town or city. As for banning smoking completely? Trust me it will never happen, theres too much money involved in the tobacco industry, and duty to pay on cigarettes. The governement would have to find milllions of pounds from somemwhere else to replace what they lose if smoking was banned, however would it not be a better use of someones time to design a cigarette that was bio degradeable? The tobacco is harmless and organic and will degrade in a few days, its the filter on the end thats the real problem and needs making eviromentaly friendly. Now stop the witch hunt on smokers and give wolverhampton a rest….
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I think the only thing wolverhampton needs is this redevelopment it is the only thing can can save the city now. The town iis a mess and looks horrid so come on council get your act together and do at least one thing to inprove this city
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IF BRAINS WERE MADE OF DYNAMITE THE COUNCIL BOSSES WOULD NOT HAVE ENOUGH TO BLOW THEIR HATS OFF
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The bins with stubbers are a brilliant idea. So sick of seeing the plasticky melted blobs on pavements by bus-stops where bins have been set on fire. Want to keep replacing them or have a proper metal structure which will last a long time?
I’m a smoker and have a flip-top ashtray which I can attach to a trouser belt-loop. I don’t want to empty this into a public bin with plastic liner ‘just in case’. Arson, even if unintentional, carries more serious consequences than littering.
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Kids will do anything for a cheap smoke. If smokers used ashtrays inside, kids would not be able to get hold of the fag ends.
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