City of Helsinki would increase organisers’ liability for post-event clean-up

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Last Friday's free fireworks happening in downtown Helsinki was a huge success, with around 120,000 turning out to watch the pyrotechnics in the night sky over Töölönlahti Bay.
      Unfortunately the presence of such a large crowd was still painfully obvious on Monday morning, for example in the Hesperia Park and on the steps outside the Parliament building. On the shores around Töölönlahti, there was plenty still to clear up by way of broken glass, paper litter, and crushed aluminium cans.
     
The city is not amused, and in the future the City of Helsinki may insist that event organisers take greater responsibility for the post-event cleaning up of the capital’s streets and parks.
      “This has been discussed before and will be discussed in the future as well”, says Raimo K. Saarinen, head of the Street and Park Division of Helsinki's Public Works Department.
     
According to Saarinen, what is problematic is deciding the extent of an area that an event organiser should tidy up afterwards.
      “Especially with something like a fireworks competition, defining the area is difficult, as people and litter will be everywhere. A landfill hill around Malminkartano, for one, was one of the best viewing areas and it is already quite far.”
      The northern suburb of Malminkartano certainly is a decent distance from the centre of town: at least ten kilometres.
      On Monday the Public Works Department was still reluctant to estimate the cost of the clean-up operation after Friday’s fireworks show.
     
The organiser of the 11th Fireworks Finnish Championships, the commercial television channel Nelonen, is willing to take greater responsibility for the cleaning up.
      “If that is required, then that is what we will do”, says Riitta Vorobieff, marketing coordinator at Nelonen.
      This year the event organiser’s responsibility was only to clean up the actual firing zone. The area was tidied up by the competing fireworks companies.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Fireworks in Helsinki, Friday night 21:30 (5.9.2008)

Helsingin Sanomat