Can Trash Wheel Clean Up Harbor?

Kellet to discuss a possible installation of a Trash Wheel on the Kinnickinnic River in November 2016, according to Lindsay Frost, Manager of Water Projects for the Milwaukee Harbor District. The district’s borders are generally south of the Third Ward, east of Walker’s Point and north of Bay View, encompassing 1,000 acres and 44,000 linear feet of water frontage.“Our organization has been in communication with the organization running the Trash Wheel efforts in Baltimore, and we’re exploring the possibilities further,” Frost says.Frost notes the advantages of Mr. Trash Wheel: “One of the things that’s really great is the Trash Wheel is very engaging. It does collect a lot of trash over in Baltimore, but it also serves as an attraction point and a reason for people to engage with the rivers again, which I think could be a benefit here.”As it happens, Milwaukee already has a waterfront trash collector with a cool name, the 50-foot long river skimmer called Lynyrd Skymmer — a clever play on the southern rock band, Lynyrd Skynyrd, which was the result of a 2011 naming contest. (Way to go, Milwaukee!) The Skymmer, owned by the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District (MMSD), pulls out trash from the Milwaukee, Menomonee, and Kinnickinnic Rivers. It has a captain and two crew members that work an average of 110 days a year, collecting trash and making a safer path for boats.The skimmer collects all kinds of trash, from tree limbs to barricades, and the occasional porta-potty. Each year, it collects around 70, 20-cubic yard dumpsters worth of trash and debris, but the installation of a Trash Wheel could improve efforts further.“I think anything that helps clean up garbage and helps keep the rivers free of debris that can damage kayaks and boats and everything else is a benefit,” says Bill Graffin, Public Information Manager for MMSD.“We want not only quality of life for people who live here to be improved, but we also want tourists and visitors to have a positive first impression of Milwaukee and the waterways,” he adds.The MMSD pays the Veolia company just over $139,000 a year to operate the river skimmer, pretty similar to the reported annual cost for Mr. Trash Wheel’s operation, of about $129,000. (Though we don’t know how many days of the year the Baltimore skimmer is operated.)But the trash wheel itself has a hefty price tag. Professor Trash Wheel, that latest one built, cost more than $550,000. Milwaukee’s river skimmer was purchased for $415,750, according to Graffin, though in current dollars that’s at least $457,000.But in Baltimore they love Mr. Trash Wheel and how it has collected more than one million pounds in trash, so organizations such as the Mar... (urbanmilwaukee)