[ChrisNorstrom]

Oh Weston, I'm in your shoes.

I'm dreaming for a day when I can start a business that installs high powered vacuum suction motors and large hoses into 20 foot utility box trucks so I can help clean the billions of tons of trash that plague our cities.

When I had time I created a hobby of cleaning up small forests and unclaimed land from trash. I'd show up in a green construction vest so people thought I was official and didn't ask questions and would bag all the trash I could find and weighed the bags on a scale. I've got an excel sheet with all my stats. I've picked up over 570 lbs of trash to date. Just in wrappers, McDonalds cups, styrofoam. It's heart breaking to see an area trashy 5 months after I cleaned it up. I stopped doing it because I started wishing death and destruction to the people who littered. It made me angry and bitter towards humanity. I was picking up its trash and it didn't give a damn. I try to ignore it but every time I see trash on the side of the road a part of me keeps saying, "You should invent something that makes it easier to clean that up, think of how clean the whole world could be". The little voice keeps saying "Imagine a giant movable vaccum cleaner mounted on a truck with large hoses sticking out. It could work. Just try.". I can't stop thinking about it.

Your story has actually inspired me to try to go ahead and pursue that dream. If it's one thing tax payers are willing to pay for it's less trash in their neighborhood.

Anyone interested shoot me an email chris at norcophoenix dot com. I know an electrician, a guy who knows where to order the trucks from, and some really cheap office space for startups. I'm in St. Louis Missouri btw.

[Uchikoma]

I might totally misunderstand you as English is not my native tongue, but in Germany - and I assume in many other parts of Europe - there are large trucks that go around streets and smaller ones in parks that have vacuums and suck up the trash.

Not sure if your idea was the invention or starting a service business to offer street cleaning services.

[bandy]

Even in St. Louis (Missouri, USA) there are street sweepers that basically look like this http://cityofgrandterrace.org/images/pages/N278/image002.jpg with brushes that move dirt and small items around and a (weak?) vacuum cleaner, as well as little trucks that are used to vacuum-clean things like parking lots like this http://bestservices1.com/yahoo_site_admin/assets/images/7684... (from the name, I'd guess that it's of German manufacture). Therefore, I'm guessing that our young friend here has something else in mind.

[ChrisNorstrom]

They only clean the streets. Not the grassy areas around which is where the trash accumulates.

[arethuza]

"small forests and unclaimed land from trash"

Sounds like a slightly different approach - rather than having a vacuum cleaner of wheels (which can't go off-road). Have an "industrial" version of a standard canister/cylinder cleaner with a very long hose that can be used to clean grass/bushes.

Sounds like a pretty good idea to me!

[Uchikoma]

Yes, this is used here too, looks like a truck with a vacuum cleaner for offroad, forrest or side of the road. Don't know about cleaning bushed though :-)

[sylvinus]

Yep, this is the French version, albeit we also have larger ones:

http://photo.europe1.fr/infos/faits-divers/eboueur-proprete-...

[hackerboos]

Road sweepers I believe they are called.

[yolesaber]

When I was visiting St. Petersburg, I saw that along Nevsky Prospekt (essentially the Fifth Ave of St. Petersburg) sanitation workers were using these large mounted vacuums to clean the streets. They weren't like tracks but rather like carts with a large, vertical component (I assume the vacuum parts) out of which came a hose. They did a pretty good job cleaning up the trash and detritus I saw along the Prospekt.

Your idea definitely has some credence.

[kabisote]

> I stopped doing it because I started wishing death and destruction to the people who littered.

"The nations were angry, and your wrath has come. The time has come for judging the dead, and for rewarding your servants the prophets and your people who revere your name, both great and small - and for destroying those who destroy the earth." (Revelation 11:18)

[gruseom]

You might find a kindred spirit in Terry Gross' recent interview with David Sedaris. He talked about what he does to relax at his English country manor: rides his bike around the exquisitely beautiful countryside and picks up trash.

[ph0rque]

I believe what you're missing from the equation is doing something profitable with that trash: either burning it to make energy (capturing the emissions in a filter and selling those, too), or something else.