- 13 hours ago
Berlin's streets and parks are drowning in trash. Waste Watchers Patrick and Eric are on the job every day to stop litterbugs.
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00:07Behind the cars, between the cars, between the cars, between the cars, between the cars, in the parks, everything is
00:11picked up by hand.
00:14Berlin's streets and parks increasingly resemble a garbage dump. Holding those responsible can be risky.
00:20Twice people tried to run me over with their cars. One person smashed my thumb.
00:30All the citizen groups battled the mountains of trash every day.
00:33Man kann, we clean it up on Friday, but on Saturday evening it looks exactly the same again.
00:52And when I look back here for a second, all this trash is just being tossed over there, right next
00:57to the river stream.
00:58We're hitting the streets with garbage investigators employed by the Berlin district of Friedrich-Hein-Keutsberg.
01:05This is how it usually looks here. It's being cleaned up over there, but over here it's still full of
01:11trash.
01:11It won't be long before this is full of trash too.
01:17Yeah, it's just sad.
01:18Yeah, it's just sad.
01:19It's just sad.
01:21Patrick and Erik are waste watchers.
01:24Their job is to keep the neighborhood clean and help keep garbage on the street.
01:49They patrol the district's litter hotspots. They're out in plain clothes to catch offenders in the act whenever possible.
01:56On Rigaer Straße they find plenty of illegally dumped waste on the sidewalks.
02:06They're free to take.
02:08Take me with you.
02:10Typical.
02:11Typical.
02:11Typical.
02:12Typical.
02:12Auf der gegenüberliegenden Straße hat man eine Badewanne, einen Stuhl, einen kleinen Schrank.
02:18I bet if you walk down the street, you'd have almost enough to furnish a house.
02:23It's just dumped there. Nobody cares anymore.
02:25It's just dumped there. Nobody cares anymore.
02:27Then, the two investigators stumble upon a hot lead that takes them straight to the person responsible.
02:34Oh, look at the box.
02:37Wait a minute.
02:39We've got something here.
02:41Yes, 101 Rigaer Straße.
02:43We've definitely found the person responsible.
02:48Maybe he'll come down.
02:50Maybe he'll come down.
02:55It's a nice idea putting things out to give away, but it's a needle.
03:00The person responsible for the trash will have to pay a fine.
03:04The supposedly good deed is a punishable offense.
03:08When it comes to fighting trash, the waste watchers are not shot.
03:12For them, trash is a treasure trove of clues.
03:17It's important that we can find something.
03:21Luckily, we have gloves.
03:23Rummaging through someone else's trash isn't pleasant.
03:26But we do it so we can find the person responsible.
03:30You always have to be careful what you touch.
03:33We've found syringes before.
03:35Sharp objects.
03:36Disgusting stuff.
03:37You can't be afraid to get your hands dirty.
03:41You can't be afraid to get your hands dirty.
03:43Let's take a look over there, that canister I saw.
03:46There's a school and a kindergarten right across the street.
03:50This really shouldn't be happening.
03:52And so it should not be happening.
03:54As we can see here, it's hazardous material.
03:57I don't know why someone would leave this here.
04:00It's obvious that kids shouldn't play with it.
04:02Unbelievable.
04:03We'll take this with us and dispose of it properly.
04:09On to the Warschauer Bridge.
04:12Here they catch a litterer red-handed.
04:14He threw a cigarette on the ground.
04:17So we're going to go over there to take his information.
04:21Hello.
04:22We're from the district of Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg.
04:25Please turn off the music.
04:27The cigarette you just smoked doesn't belong on the ground.
04:30It constitutes a public offense.
04:32You may make a statement, but you don't have to.
04:35I need to see your ID, please.
04:37Is this address still current?
04:40The offender faces a fine of 250 euros.
04:43He reacts calmly.
04:45But that's not always the case.
04:48Personally, I've been attacked multiple times.
04:51Twice people tried to run me over with their cars.
04:54One person smashed my thumb.
04:56It's something you just have to deal with.
04:58You can't let it get to you.
05:05Berlin resident Tommy Holper had had enough of the trash on his doorstep.
05:09So he decided to make reporting trash easier.
05:12He found the city's app too difficult to use.
05:17It always takes a little longer.
05:20You have to stop.
05:21You have to enter the data.
05:23And at some point I realized that I no longer had the energy to report it every time there was
05:27something lying around.
05:28And I thought, there has to be an easier way.
05:35So he developed his own reporting app.
05:38The idea is simple.
05:40Take a photo, share your location, and the trash is reported to the local authorities.
05:47I, myself, am from the Netherlands.
05:50And it was never like that there.
05:52Twenty years ago, when there was trash lying around my skull, the local government just put out giant trash bins.
05:57So it was clear to everyone where the trash belonged.
06:00And somehow those pragmatic solutions are missing here.
06:07A map shows where the trash hotspots are, especially in vetting.
06:13Tommy Holper hopes that if it's not a hassle to report trash, more people will participate and the trash will
06:19be cleaned up faster.
06:20One of the worst spots is a street from Freundspark Beiberger, where illegal commercial waste is dumped, as one resident
06:27explains.
06:29I got here yesterday morning.
06:31All of these old building materials are left here.
06:33And they're full of asbestos.
06:35They just dumped them in the park.
06:42Hello, everyone.
06:43My name is Valerie.
06:44I'm the one who maybe you saw on Airbnb I started at all.
06:49Sunday morning in Berlin, Wedding.
06:51About 30 volunteers get instructions from Valeria Tansileva.
06:55She founded the Sauber initiative a year ago, out of frustration with the trash on her doorstep.
07:00No one cleaned it up.
07:03So I thought, maybe I can do it myself.
07:06So I bought gloves.
07:08I bought trash bags.
07:10And, well, I just cleaned it up myself.
07:15She posted a video of her clean-up effort online.
07:18And the response was overwhelming.
07:21I posted it as an Insta story saying, yeah, I cleaned up a bit today.
07:28And I got so many responses.
07:31More than 1,000.
07:33The volunteers collect everything.
07:35In coordination with Berlin Waste Management Authority, the trash is left at the curb for
07:40pickup.
07:41During each clean-up, they count how many bags are filled.
07:44A lot of people think I'm doing these clean-ups just for myself.
07:50Because I want to be famous.
07:52This would be well known.
07:54Absolutely not.
07:56I don't want anything to do with the trash.
07:58Who wants to be famous because he is cleaning the trash?
08:02And shit.
08:02No one.
08:03No one.
08:04Over and over again, they find trash related to drug use.
08:07It reminds them of how important their work is.
08:10Oh, look.
08:11This is drugs.
08:12That's from drugs.
08:14So when they buy drugs, they come in these little bags.
08:20Look, right next to the playground.
08:26These community clean-ups aren't just about picking up trash.
08:29They're about sending the message that Berliners can't let their city fall apart.
08:35Dozens of people now show up for every clean-up.
08:38One of them is Stefan Thorn.
08:41And he's seen it all.
08:43The most absurd, but the most absurd one was a gramophone from the 1920s.
08:49It was almost in perfect evening.
08:52They pulled it out from somewhere deep in the bushes.
08:54But we're constantly boiling all sorts of stuff.
08:58It's like some people are clearing their entire apartment and don't think everything on the street.
09:03But that was definitely the best place.
09:06Today however, all they find is ordinary trash.
09:11I think we'll definitely get this park clean.
09:13I think we'll definitely get this park clean.
09:14It's pretty rough right now.
09:16It's pretty rough right now.
09:17It's obviously a place that's been pretty much ruined.
09:20It's obviously a place that's been pretty much ruined.
09:20But it'll look better again than this.
09:20But it'll look better again than this.
09:22It'll look better again than this.
09:25After more than three hours of picking up trash, everyone is a little exhausted.
09:29But pleased.
09:30They collected 98 trash bags today.
09:33And the park is noticeably freedom.
09:50The professionals in Berlin's Waste Management Service have to tackle the really big stuff.
09:56Everywhere from tree to tree.
10:00A unit of the Berlin City Cleaning Department is out every day to remove illegally dumped trash.
10:05from the street.
10:06The five person team handles bulky waste, electronic waste and construction debris.
10:12They use big equipment.
10:14A truck meant for bulky waste, a compactor and a dumpster truck with a crank.
10:20Now we're turning onto a street where a lot of industrial waste is dumped.
10:24It's so good.
10:29It's so good.
10:29It's really a big thing.
10:31It's really big.
10:32You can clean it up on Friday, but it's Saturday evening.
10:35You can clean it up on Friday, but it's Saturday evening.
10:35It looks the same.
10:37There's no reason for anyone in Berlin to throw their trash on the street.
10:41There are 14 recycling centers where most household waste can be dropped off for free.
10:46Commercial waste, on the other hand, must be disposed of properly.
10:50And that, of course, costs money.
10:52So, a lot of large items and electronic waste end up on the street.
10:56Now we have a refrigerator shift.
10:59This happens every day, unfortunately.
11:02We have to go out and play the streets of this stuff every day.
11:05This is already the fifth one today.
11:09And it's only nine in the morning.
11:12The work is physically demanding.
11:15Behind the cars, between the cars, in the parks.
11:19Everything is picked up by hand.
11:20So, so, man muss sich alles per Hand rausholen.
11:22Then unload it again.
11:22Then unload it again.
11:23Then unload it again.
11:23We don't use much machinery.
11:25It's all done by Heron.
11:25Wenig Maschinenarbeit, alles mit der Hand halt.
11:30Komm, mal geht's hier rein.
11:32Komm, fängt in hoch.
11:35Ganz anders entsorgt.
11:37Alles Altöl in einer Wasserflasche.
11:40Noch einer.
11:40Hier ist noch einer.
11:42Ach, hier oben, auch noch.
11:47Also Autofürmen, man findet hier immer Autoreifen.
11:49I don't know what cars are going on.
11:5150 liters of waste oil will now be properly disposed of.
11:55Andreas Kutschan has been doing this for 35 years and has seen a lot.
11:58But he's still sometimes shocked by how people behave.
12:01And then they even see us and still throw their trash on the street right in front of us.
12:07And if you say something to the ballot, they don't even react.
12:11No reaction.
12:12It doesn't appear that mindsets are changing any time soon.
12:16So, if it weren't for the help of city workers and volunteers, Berlin would probably end up drowning in a
12:22sea of trash.
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