David Grover, Department of Geography and Environment, London School of Economics wrote an excellent letter to the Financial Times about the hidden cost of free newspapers. Here’s part of what he wrote:
Free dailies externalise their production costs in at least three ways. They clutter and detract from the appearance of our streetscapes and public spaces (costs to all Londoners); they generate great volumes of rubbish which then become the disposal problem of boroughs (costs to borough residents); and they create extra cleaning costs for Transport for London when papers are left behind on trains and in stations (costs to TfL and therefore transport users).
In January, the Guardian newspaper reported that Westminster Council has approached publishers about the waste problem:
The council has warned News International and Associated Newspapers that they must help the council deal with the “mountain of waste” their newspapers produce, or face restrictions that could see them banned from its environs, including the West End.
The BBC has more on this story here. I first bloogged about free newspaper trash on July 29 last year, recording what I saw on a train just after rush hour – 50 copies of mX left on seats and the floor in on carriage!
All this is timely give the march of News Ltd’s free daily mX to Brisbane having conquered Melbourne and Sydney.
These ‘free’ newspapers should have to pay for cleaning costs on public transport, since these are the key areas they target. The situation is particularly bad in Sydney where you might see papers up to a week old littering the trains.