Vancouver resident called a ‘hero’ for cleaning up Knight Street garbage

Vancouver resident Cliff Relph was tired of seeing the area around his home littered with garbage.

He lives in the Kensington neighbourhood, near Knight Street, and in August started noticing just how much garbage people were leaving on the streets and not disposing of properly.

“It took me a while, but when walking home from the store I saw how bad the problem had become lately,” said Relph in an email interview. “And I said ‘someone should take care of this. Wait… I’m a someone.’ So, I figured out a way I scale it, in a way that I could handle in my day to day life.”

He said his grandmother passed away in December and she always loved doing things like this for her community and that inspired him further.

Relph has been documenting all his garbage finds on his Tumblr blog and recently shared some of his photos on Reddit where the post received a lot of attention and praise from fellow residents.

They even dubbed him a hero.

“The Flash is a hero” joked Relph, “but I’m just someone who wants to try to keep Vancouver the awesome place that it is.”

He said, sadly, he’s not too surprised to see so much garbage being left on the street.

“I’ve enjoyed living in Vancouver for four years now, and it’s not that surprising to see it,” he said. “What has surprised me is how quickly it comes back after being cleaned out. It’s disappointing… but I understand why. What also surprises me is the variety of stuff I’ve come across. I thought I’d be picking up mostly gum wrappers and cigarettes, but there’s been a lot more than that.”

So far, he has found items like a disembodied horse head from a children’s toy, but never found the rest and 50 batteries on the ground by a bus stop. But the strangest thing he says he’s seen is a plant growing out of a cardboard circle. “It had been raining a lot, and it was nice to see that a plant was trying to make the best of the situation,” he said. “What I’ve hated seeing the most is the mattress in King Crest Park. That showed up one day, and has been there for about a month now. It’s not the only mattress I’ve come across while cleaning, but they’re a little bit outside my means to get rid of them though.”

Relph will sometimes toss the garbage he collects in the bins at King Crest Park or he will take it home to his garbage can.

He said he will continue to do it for as long as he can, although he does not enjoy picking up garbage in the rain.

“It’s a fun, but sometimes gross way to try to make a difference, and I like that.”

He would like to see more people take it upon themselves to clean up their neighbourhood.

“I think people will be surprised what they can accomplish,” he said. “It doesn’t take much of a commitment to see some change. Vancouver is a wonderful place, and I feel fortunate to be able to live here. But when a place is wonderful like this, it becomes our duty to take care of it. This is my way to do that.”