The city is now installing reserve tanks on
garbage trucks to corral the extra sludge that accumulates during the rainy
season.
Pratchaya Kerdthong
While garbage vehicles never smell sweet, Pattaya
residents often complain that the city’s trash trucks stink particularly
badly.
Pramot Sabsang, Pattaya’s director of resources and
environment, often finds himself explaining why city garbage trucks smell so
bad they actually stink up half the soi they’re on. He says it’s all about
the water.
Each of the 20 trucks Pattaya owns and the 30 operated on
behalf of the city by Invest Management Co. are equipped with water tanks to
catch the myriad of pungent liquids seeping out of trash bins.
But during rainy season, he said, rainwater gets into
garbage cans - largely, he says, because residents neglect to cover their
bins - and the trucks’ water tanks quickly fill and overflow. The result is
slow-moving smelly green monsters leaving a snail-like trail of som
tam-and-dirty-diaper-flavored runoff.
Pramot said the city is now installing reserve tanks on
garbage trucks to corral the extra sludge. The city will also confine
garbage collection to 11 p.m. to 5 a.m., with trucks making two rounds each
day.
In the end, however, it comes down to Pattaya’s residents
to do a better job of managing their refuse and cleaning their property,
Pramot said.
“The Pattaya area has seen a very rapid increase in population and now
produces 300-350 tons of garbage a day,” he explained. “People have to
realize they have a responsibility to focus on cleaning exteriors and think
more about refuse left in bins and not littering. This will help garbage
collectors work faster and better.”
