Our first major hurdle was that coordinating the schedules of three people proved surprisingly difficult and sorting out the timing took a lot of effort. Once we arrived at Lafarge, we faced an unexpected shift in the project’s scope: there was a lot less general litter than we had anticipated, but we discovered hazardous materials including syringes, dirty medical gloves, broken glass, and metal wires. We had to immediately pivot our approach, slowing down our pace and prioritizing safety measures to ensure no one was injured or exposed to biohazards while handling these dangerous items. Overcoming this meant moving past our initial plan and adapting to the reality of the environment
This project fundamentally shifted our perspective on public spaces by showing us that surface appearances can be highly deceptive. From a distance, Lafarge appeared clean and well-maintained, but a closer inspection of the grass and bushes revealed that the most harmful pollution is often hidden from plain sight. It made us realize that community safety requires looking beyond obvious litter to address less visible, higher-risk hazards. Furthermore, seeing the low amount of standard garbage gave us a new appreciation for the local city workers and volunteers whose daily, behind-the-scenes maintenance keeps the park clean in the first place. It also made me have hope that people keep our local recreational areas cleaner than we expected, which is great.
Moving forward, this experience will directly influence how we plan community service projects and handle environmental initiatives. In the future, we will not rely on standard plastic bags alone; we now know to properly equip ourselves with heavy-duty, puncture-resistant gloves, trash grabbers, and rigid containers specifically designed for disposing of sharp biohazards safely. To add, we learned the importance of organizing schedules and communication much earlier to avoid timeline conflicts. Finally, we decided that if we encounter highly hazardous objects like medical waste or live wiring again, we will make the decision to log the location and report it to city officials rather than attempting to handle it ourselves.
Although our cleanup was localized to Lafarge, the project has meaningful impacts both for our community and the broader environment. Locally, removing discarded needles, broken glass, and contaminated gloves creates an immediate safety benefit for the families, children, and pets who visit the park every day, preventing potential injuries and health risks. On a larger scale, taking visible action encourages a culture of civic responsibility among onlookers, showing that anyone can step up to care for shared spaces. Additionally, by collecting these synthetic materials and metals before they could wash into local waterways, we prevented them from breaking down into microplastics, making a small but vital contribution to global environmental preservation.
