According to a 1954 Hartford Courant article, people were dumping trash directly in the Park River, and at the time, city government was unresponsive. People would drive to dead end streets and heave their junk into the water. A resident of Hamilton Street noted that this problem was “getting worse since the new garbage disposal rules went into effect.” The Health Department is quoted: “no one has ever been arrested for dumping anything in the Park River, despite the fact that dumping there is a flagrant violation of the law.”
This photo was taken in March 2019 at the corner of Hamilton and Wellington Streets — not far from the concrete channel that the Park River has been forced within. Litter is also visible all along the remnants of Wellington Street’s sidewalk. A search of HartfordData reveals how many littering incidents have been recorded by the Hartford Police Department from 2005 to present.
