The Toronto Harbour is a city favourite. It provides open green space with waterfront views, and is home to cultural events, live entertainment and craft exhibits.
Unfortunately, the beautiful scenery also comes with something else… litter. We have reported litter coming down the Don River, floating in the Toronto Harbour, and impacting local wildlife.
To better understand this issue and inform local solutions, we collaborate with PortsToronto and Toronto Region Conservation Authority on local research and technological solutions to prevent and clean up floating plastic and other anthropogenic litter in our beloved harbour.
This project focuses on downstream solutions. Interested in upstream solutions? Check out our Pollution Prevention Projects where we work to reduce plastic pollution – one source at a time!
Tracking and Trapping Trash
To inform solutions such as trash capture devices, our tracking trash research aims to understand the sources and fate of floating litter on our local waterfront (how does our litter enter the water, move from point A to B, and where does it eventually accumulate). These questions will help inform policies aimed at upstream solutions and technologies for trapping trash downstream, before it has a chance to flow into Lake Ontario.
Learn more about how we’re answering these questions here.
Our work diverting litter and collecting data on the Toronto Waterfront contributes to the Toronto Inner Harbour Floatables Strategy, a partnership with PortsToronto, TRCA and several City of Toronto divisions, with support from Swim Drink Fish, Harbourfront Centre and the Waterfront BIA.