Fun in the park ignores green

It was a shock to arrive at Zoo Lake on a Sunday afternoon, with a picnic basket in hand, to find usually picturesque open spaces of the park swamped in rubbish.

Heineken beer bottles and other branded alcohol bottles caught the spring sunlight on the grass, among dirty paper plates, polystyrene take-away boxes, plastic packets, and even a baby's dirty nappy. It was clear there had been a sponsored event for hundreds of people at the park. Certainly a big enough crowd to litter the entire park with remnants of what looked like Dionysiac festivities.

Many Sunday picnickers simply set up their braais, cooler boxes and camping chairs in among the rubbish, while others cleared a space for themselves. As I picked my way through Saturday's waste, I predictably wanted to lay the blame somewhere.

Firstly, where were the event organisers who didn't consider providing bins or a park-friendly clean up as part of their job?

And where was City Parks? Surely there should have been a scheduled morning clean-up, knowing the park's tradition of Sunday picknickers? Zoo Lake was a gift to the city from its early capitalists under the condition that it was "to remain open to people of all races". The use of the park should be regulated and enough bins and services provided to deliver on its promise.

But what about us, the people of the park - how much are we to blame?How can we get up and walk away from piles of our own rubbish after a day of fun? Perhaps too many of us assume that someone else will take care of it, in that classic South African way. Or has our sense of ownership of public space become so eroded that we just don't care what happens outside of our own homes?

I am worried about this because we South Africans already have a deficit of accessible public spaces. This is compounded by a common lack of a sense of community, in strong part because of our history of separation and inequality. If we can't look after public spaces like our parks, how are we going to clean up global problems like the climate crisis we are heading towards? Epic fail.