Baltimore Ravens winning, but tailgating fans are trashing neighborhood
Party litter on city land “won’t happen again” Stadium Authority vows.
Above: George Hall points to the sign that some Ravens tailgaters routinely ignore.
Baltimore Ravens fans enjoyed a home game win Sunday but once again left behind a mess that stadium neighbors say has made them feel like losers – a rank residue of discarded food and empty booze bottles along a strip of parkland that’s used by school kids and bicyclists.
A sign saying “NO TAILGATING ON SIDEWALK OR GRASS” – a second sign has been ripped off its post – is ignored on game days, according to residents of Sharp-Leadenhall, a historic black neighborhood located just east of M&T Bank Stadium.
“They take their food and drink and party over here,” said George Hall, who has lived in the neighborhood for years. “They really make a mess out of it.”
Thomas General, who lives around the corner on West Street, says tailgaters’ trash has been a tradition for as long as the Ravens have been at the stadium (they started playing there in 1998). “They just leave whatever on the sidewalk,” he said. “It attracts rats and fouls up the neighborhood.”
The trash found yesterday along the boundary of Solo Gibbs Park and the Gywnns Falls Bike Trail – just half a block from the Sharp-Leadenhall Elementary School – made a sharp contrast to the immaculate condition of the stadium parking lot itself.
The lot, under I-395, is swept down after every game by crews hired by the Maryland Stadium Authority, which operates the stadium.
Trash Has Been a Problem
Vernon Conaway Jr., director of public safety and security for the stadium authority, acknowledged yesterday that trash has been a problem along the bike corridor and parkland, which is owned by the city and is not under the control of the stadium.
The parking lot below I-395 was swept clean yesterday by stadium crews. (Photo by Mark Reutter)
“This is unsatisfactory and won’t happen again,” Conaway told The Brew. “We need to be good neighbors and take care of our own trash.”
Conaway said that Sunday was his first day as security director. After conferring with retiring director Jim Slusser, Conaway said that the Authority has made several attempts in the past to control the trash.
Last year, the agency erected a snow fence to separate the parking lot from the bike trail and grassy lot.
The fence wasn’t installed on Sunday in part because of high winds. Conaway also speculated that some of the debris found yesterday blew in from elsewhere.
He readily conceded, though, that the Corona beer carton, wine bottles and pizza boxes found along the trail were overwhelmingly the product of littering sports fans.
Promises a Clean Next Game
He said the authority’s recycling program, which provides tailgaters with drop areas for paper, bottles and plastic goods, has helped reduced the cleanup after games.
“We can figure out better ways to collect [the trash] from that area, but our objective is to prevent it from happening in the first place.”
Conaway said his office will patrol the perimeter of the lots and “remind tailgaters not to encroach” on Solo Gibbs or the bike trail.
Debris yesterday along the Gwynns Falls Bike Trail. A block ahead is the Sharp-Leadenhall Elementary School. (Photo by Mark Reutter)
“Parking spaces are very valuable to fans, so we have ways to make sure everybody is being a good neighbor.”
He said the authority’s heightened efforts at cleanliness will start during the next Ravens home game on Oct. 30.
Betty Bland-Thomas, president of the Sharp-Leadenhall Planning Council, said she’ll be on the alert to monitor the trash situation.
“We want the grass and trail as clean Monday morning as the M&T parking lot is,” she said yesterday.