Less Is More At the Beach

East Hampton Town may test a radical trash concept this summer, asking those who go to the popular Indian Wells Beach in Amagansett, or perhaps another location, to take away all the waste they generate, removing all of the receptacles usually there.

“Take only pictures, leave only footprints” is a mantra for the use of many public lands, including national wilderness areas. Whether it would work here is an open question, but it is an experiment worth taking on.

As things stand now, during the peak summer season the margins of the ocean beach parking lots often look like disaster areas at the end of the day. This is when everyone floods off the sand toward their vehicles, dropping anything and everything at the bins and leaving bags, broken chairs, beer boxes, and busted umbrellas alongside them when there is no more room. If you pause for a moment and reflect on the scene, you may wonder exactly why, when these beachgoers brought all this stuff there, they do not take it home, especially when the garbage cans are filled to overflowing.

Getting people to change their ways and to clean up after themselves and take responsibility for the waste they produce is likely to take time, but that is no reason not to try. If anything, it would be hard to imagine that the immediate outcome of such a move could be any worse than the seagulls’ smorgasbords that already ensue.