£25,000 to be spent removing chewing gum from streets in Oxford

The battle against chewing gum in Oxford is being given a boost, with £25,000 put towards tackling the sticky issue.

A grant from the Chewing Gum Task Force, administered by environmental charity Keep Britain Tidy, will help Oxford City Council clean up gum and reduce gum littering.

Chewing gum will be removed from a number of locations, including Magdalen Street, Broad Street, Cornmarket Street, Carfax and Castle Street flowing into Norfolk Street.

Removing chewing gum is not easy. It takes on average 30 mins to cover 15m2 of clearing gum with a steam cleaner, followed by a mechanical sweeper to leave the area at an acceptable standard. 

The chewing Gum Task Force Grant Scheme is open to councils across the UK who wish to clean up chewing gum on their streets and invest in ways to prevent gum from being dropped in the first place.

The Task Force is funded by major gum manufacturers including Mars Wrigley and Perfetti Van Melle, with the investment spread over five years.

This year, the selected councils will receive funding totalling more than £1.2 million.

Monitoring and evaluation carried out by Behaviour Change has shown that in areas that benefitted last year a reduced rate of gum littering is still being observed six months after clean-up and the installation of prevention materials.

Councillor Susan Brown, Leader of Oxford City Council, said: “Street cleansing happens regularly in Oxford but chewing gum requires specific spot and stain removal, so is a problem for most towns and cities.

“This latest clean-up will boost a feeling of pride in our beautiful city centre and makes Oxford feel cleaner and more welcoming to visitors. Clean streets also encourage the opening of new outlets by traders, who see a cared-for city and want to invest in it.”

Around 87% of England’s streets are stained with gum, according to research by Keep Britain Tidy.

Not only will this funding remove gum that is already there, it will help to deter people from dropping more. Previous pilots have managed to reduce gum littering by up to 64%.