Chewing gum stains will be deep-cleaned from the streets of Hull city centre starting this weekend, thanks to a £20,000 Chewing Gum Task Force grant awarded to Hull City Council.
Discarded chewing gum has a negative environmental impact on the city centre, as well as other high-footfall shopping areas in the city.
The council will carry out a deep clean overnight on Sunday (16 October) from 10pm. Areas that will be cleaned include Whitefriargate, Queen Victoria Square, King Edward Street and Jameson Street.
The Chewing Gum Task Force was established by the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra) and is run by environmental charity Keep Britain Tidy.
The £20,000 funding was awarded to Hull City Council as part of a package of up to £10million, paid for by major gum manufacturers, including Mars Wrigley and Perfetti Van Melle, to tackle chewing gum stains.
The investment is being shared across local authorities in England and will be spread over five years.
Councillor Julia Conner, Portfolio Holder for the Environment, said: “Mess from chewing gum is one of the most frequent complaints from residents about Hull city centre, so it’s great that after the deep clean, we’ll see a gleaming city centre that we can all enjoy and take pride in.”
“I hope this campaign will also make people think twice before dropping their gum and leaving an unsightly mess.”
The funding is also being used to put up new “Please bin your gum” signs as part of a campaign to encourage people to dispose of their gum properly.
Previous pilot schemes using these signs, run by Mars Wrigley and not-for-profit social enterprise Behaviour Change, have reduced gum littering by up to 64 per cent.
For more information, email loveyourstreetproject@hullcc.gov.uk
