Baltimore's Back River is tons cleaner, for now.   A yearlong community cleanup effort has netted 2,000 tires and 170 tons of debris -- including eight massive conduit pipes, Mary Gail Hare reports in The Baltimore Sun.

The pipes, four feet in diameter and weighing hundreds of pounds each, apparently were washed down Herring Run more than three miles from a bridge construction project during a torrential downpour nearly two weeks ago. 

Brian Schilpp, a county teacher who is coordinating the cleanup campaign, sent the above photo of two of them, trapped along with lots of other trash and debris by a boom Baltimore County has strung across the upper reach of the river.

"For people who think a tire can't float, think about the water power that pushed 20-foot-long pipes downstream," Schilpp told Hare.

County officials honored Schilpp and other volunteers, as well as four college students who spent the summer cleaning debris from the river and working to organize the community.  I watched the kids at work one sweltering morning in July, and I can tell you, they earned their minimum wage many times over!  For them, though, it was about more than just the money, but a chance to do some good.

It's a great facelift for one of the most degraded rivers in the Chesapeake Bay, which lately has been showing some signs of life.  But unless something's done to curb the careless littering - and outright dumping - it'll only be a temporary improvement.  Here's hoping this leads to more permanent solutions, and not just another round of trash cleanups.
 

(Photo courtesy Brian Schilpp)