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Installing cigarette butt infrastructure – cigarette butt bins, outdoor ashtrays or butt litter bins – makes disposing of cigarette butts easier.

Various issues to be considered when purchasing and installing butt bins are outlined below, including types of bins and where they're best placed.

Which type of butt bin?

There are many types of butt bins available, generally categorised as permanent, mobile, personal or windproof. A number of aspects about a hotspot will determine which butt bin type is appropriate, such as the activity of the audience, other waste infrastructure in the area and how they can be attached.

Butt Free Australia has developed guidelines for bin selection, which can be downloaded from the Tools list below. See 'ButtFREE – Which type of butt bin' in the Tools list below.

See ButtFREE Context guidelines (Tool downloads) to check appropriate infrastructure according to hotspot Context.

See ButtFREE Solutions Infrastructure for a comprehensive list of bins and Australian suppliers.

Where should butt bins be placed?

First be guided by butt litter hotspots and Council guidelines. It is then advisable to attempt to create consistency in where butt bins are placed.

Butt litter hotspots

Within hotspots, consider:

What are the majority of litterers doing while in this area?
Walking through, waiting, standing outside a building, or entering through a doorway?
Can the butt bin be seen clearly from areas of activity?
Is there a position from where the butt bin can be seen clearly by most people?
Where can the butt bin be attached?
Once the audience, their activity and the best location is found, determine where you can attach the bin. Consider: general rubbish bins, poles, walls. Also remember to allow clearance underneath butt bins for emptying and to avoid any nearby fire risks.

Council guidelines

Council guidelines for infrastructure installation consider health and safety, heritage values and other issues. If Council guidelines prohibit permanent placement of bins in an identified hotspot, consider other bins types or alternatives. See the 'Which type of butt bin?' in the Tools list below.

If the hotspots are found in 'no-smoking' areas, Education is your key response (see previous section). Talk with business owners or Council as to where the people habitually using these areas should be smoking. Then advise them through signage and internal communication to refrain from using these areas, ensuring that the preferred area has a butt bin available.

A number of large city councils have designed unique general litter infrastructure to allow for cigarette butt disposal. Some types combine the litter and some attempt to separate it. Those that have separated the extinguishing and disposal of cigarette butts seem to have been successful, with lower rate of bin fires. The separation of extinguishing and disposal of cigarette butts is an obvious advantage for dedicated butt bins.

Consistency

Part of fostering behaviour change from an undesired to a desired behaviour is to clearly articulate the expected behaviour. Consistent placement and design of butt bins would clearly indicate what people are expected to do (butt it, then bin it) and where (in a butt bin – where you normally find a rubbish bin).

One suggestion for consistency – place butt bins near or attached to general rubbish bins. This is beneficial for two reasons: (1) much like we expect general rubbish bins near shops or major road intersections, smokers will start to expect butt bins in the same area; and (2) if butt bins are placed too far from rubbish bins, they tend to be used for other waste, potentially leading to fires and rendering them ineffective.

How many butt bins are needed?

There's no formula for the number of butt bins required in any area. A balance is needed between where to place bins, their volume and the number of bins. It's greatly determined by the amount of people using the area, cleaning regimes and the type of area.

It’s important to remember the more visible, accessible and well-signed bins are, the fewer you will need. Factor in costs for the development and installation of signage for bins in addition to their purchase.

For example, a large bin in a highly visible position may be more effective than three small bins that could blend into the urban landscape – they may not be used if not seen and they will take longer to empty.

A plea often heard from litterers is that there aren't enough bins and that's why they litter. While this may be true in some areas, placing bins everywhere people smoke would result in the street being 'littered' with bins. A balance is therefore also needed between the responsibility of smokers to find a bin or carry a personal ashtray, and an adequate number being provided.

Who will service and maintain the butt bins?

How many bins, where you put them and how much it will cost may be heavily influenced by who will service them. Butt bin service and maintenance is perhaps the most important consideration, as it's the most expensive element of installation in the long term, and will also ensure their ongoing use and effectiveness.

Options to consider:

Some companies will negotiate service agreements with butt bin sales.
Councils may have contracted general waste services that could include butt bins.
Talk to professional contractors about their ideas on effectively servicing butt litter infrastructure.
Take tips from cities that have found a combination of the above issues that work.
Perhaps your Context includes businesses or facilities that could take on the servicing responsibility.

Butt bins and smoking

You may come across a view in some sectors that butt bins encourage, facilitate or support smoking.

While provision of butt bins may influence where the more responsible smoker stands to smoke, Butt Free Australia has found no evidence to support the view that they encourage smoking.

Butt Free Australia suggests that butt bins do not encourage smoking, any more than rubbish bins encourage eating or drinking. As long as smoking is legal, butt bins are necessary.

Action – Infrastructure

Refer to Assessment of hotspots for any observations of infrastructure need.
Read the Context guide relevant to your hotspots for suggestions on infrastructure.
Prepare estimates of the type, placement, cost and servicing of bins in your hotspots.
Enter into your budget.