LITTER
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] Sin,—Could you not bring your powerful influence to bear on the question of the untidiness caused in streets, trams and ;buses by throwing down used tickets ? Most large provincial cities have for years successfully collected them in suitable receptacles. Why not London ?—I am, Sir, &c.,
J. H. McEwAN.
[There certainly ought to be receptacles for omnibus and tram tickets, as we have several times said in the Spectator. During the War, wheal paper was scarce, there were such things. There might be receptacles of two sorts—first in the vehicles themselves and secondly in the streets, at the stopping places. " Safety First " is a good motto, but " Tidiness First " is as important for the soul as the other is for the body. By appropriate instructions and publicity it would. probably be possible to build up the habit of putting used tickets into the receptacles. At present the temptation to throw them on xo the ground is very great as the tickets are tiny things, and even people who are normally tidy are accustomed to throw them away. There is a kind of moral or social intimidation that is very valuable, and if this were put in motion it might come to be regarded as bad form, as the sign of a boor, to throw down omnibus and tram tickets. It is true that these tickets form a very small part of the total litter of the streets, but the point is that a habit once formed would be capable of indefinite application. A man who had disciplined himself to dispose tidily of a ticket would not throw to the winds a much larger piece of paper in a public park.—En. Spectator.]
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