More than one in four French people… Too many motorists still throw their rubbish out of the window

Bernadette Moreau (from behind) well surrounded to get her prevention messages across. Midi Libre – JEAN-MICHEL MART

According to the latest study by the Vinci Foundation, 27% of French people still admit to getting rid of rubbish from their vehicle. And 24% of smokers admit to getting rid of their cigarette butts this way. On the motorway as well as on the secondary network, this remains a real problem. Illustration on the A9 and the departmental roads of Hérault.

On this Friday, the start of a weekend of cross-country, the Ambrussum rest area, located between Nîmes and Montpellier on the A9, is already quite full. A motorist takes advantage of his break to light a cigarette, he is immediately approached by a volunteer from the communal forest fire committee (CCFF) of the village of Sussargues. "Did you know that it is dangerous to throw a cigarette butt in nature ?", he asks him, before offering him a mini-ashtray to store ashes and cigarette butts if he wants to smoke while driving.

This user was already aware, but this is not the case for all smokers. "We recently carried out a survey on the A8 (which connects Aix-en-Provence to the Côte d'Azur, Editor's note) and in a single kilometer, in a single direction of traffic, we counted more than 100 cigarette butts", reveals Bernadette Moreau, general delegate of the Vinci Autoroutes Foundation. A finding that corroborates the latest survey commissioned by the company from Ipsos. "On the motorway, 27% of French people admit to throwing rubbish out of their car window; 24% of smokers have the same reflex with their cigarette butt," she explains. Figures that are all the more astonishing as they remain stable from one year to the next.

Operation #StopMégots on the highway

That day, Vinci installed its “#StopMégots” operation at the Ambrussum rest area, a series of signs reminding people that a single cigarette can cause devastating fires. Firefighters, police officers, elected officials and volunteers joined Vinci and the Entente Valabre to spread the good word in the car parks, particularly to holidaymakers. “The survey shows that smokers who live in high-risk regions are less likely to throw away their cigarette butts: 19% in Paca, 16% in Occitanie, 10% in Nouvelle-Aquitaine… On the other hand, 36% of them do it in Île-de-France, so we need to raise awareness on their holiday routes,” continues Bernadette Moreau. She points out that beyond the fire risk, this action that some believe to be harmless also has an impact on the environment. “A single cigarette butt pollutes up to 500 liters of water”.

This problem applies to all waste thrown away by motorists. “A package, a bottle, can have an impact on water and soil, on biodiversity if animals ingest plastic… And even on safety”. That of motorists whose driving can be disrupted to the point of causing an accident, like that of the agents responsible for the proper maintenance of the roads. “They take risks to go and pick up various objects. It is estimated that 3 tonnes of waste are collected each day on the A9“, says Laurent Noé, head of Mediterranean communications at Vinci Autoroutes. Across the entire French network, 25 tonnes of wild waste are collected daily.

A nice gesture for the environment

The Ipsos survey is all the more worrying because it shows an even more significant trend among young people under 35. “40% of them now say they throw rubbish out of their window when driving on the motorway: their organic waste (32%), their cigarette butts (36%), paper and packaging (21%) or even plastic bottles or cans (19%)”, relays Bernadette Moreau. All the more desperate since “you can find a rest area with trash cans every ten minutes”.

During this Olympic Games period, a communication campaign "Jettomania", inviting everyone "to do something nice for the environment" – throwing waste in the trash – with the humorous complicity of sports commentator Grégoire Margotton, was therefore launched on social networks.

On the secondary network too…

The lack of civic-mindedness obviously does not only affect motorways. In Hérault, the vice-president of the departmental council responsible for roads Philippe Vidal initiates every year "a major spring cleaning", a day when 450 agents are mobilized to clean the edges of part of the 4,700 km of departmental roads. An operation above all "symbolic" which aims to make an impression. “Every year, the equivalent of 2.5 buses full of waste is collected. We want to show that it is a scourge. And for us, it is a never-ending job that costs a lot of money”, regrets the elected official, who adds, to the pollution, another impact: “We are in a tourist department and our roads are showcases for tourists who arrive by motorway. So much waste in the ditches, it harms the image of our territory".

And even more so, if the vegetation is burned because of a cigarette butt casually thrown out the window. So also to make an impression, in 2017, the Hérault firefighters launched a message that went viral with the image of a cigarette finishing burning on the road with this text: "This little gesture that makes you a big jerk". There are different ways to get the same message across…

A violation that can cost you dearly

Present on the A9 for the #StopMégots operation, the captain of the departmental road safety squadron (EDSR) of Poussan, St&eacutephane Heinen, recalled that throwing waste or cigarette butts is an offence that can lead the police to move from prevention to repression, if a motorist is caught in the act. And the can, the packaging or the cigarette can be expensive. A police officer or gendarme can indeed impose a fine of 135 euros on the person responsible. This must be paid within 45 days of the notice being sent; after this period, it may be increased to 450 €.

Article R635-8 of the Penal Code even provides that throwing waste out of the window, when it has been transported using a vehicle, constitutes a fifth-class fine that can rise to 1,500€ and lead to the confiscation of the vehicle.

The penalty can be even harsher if the small gesture has major consequences. In 2016, in Marseille, a mason who started a fire with his cigarette butt that ravaged more than 2,500 hectares and a hundred homes, causing nearly €63 million in damage, was sentenced to 5 years in prison, including 4 years suspended.

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