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Originally Posted by K-Man
I have to agree Keith. I wonder if that's the reason why so many vehicles were left lying around - no property owners wanted to have to endure the expense of cleaning up someone else's ignorant mess.
A few posts back (#1059) you spoke of the cars being lined up along side the tracks deliberately. I wonder if that was just the railways placing them that way to avoid any kind of removal expenses while getting them safely out of the way of trains? I'm sure some of those vehicles in were dumped off by the owners with that mind set - to let someone else deal with the cleanup and disposal fees....especially if it was city or corporate owned land.
That was some insightful thinking OldDartmouthMark to check the minutes of city meetings....that's a resource that never even crossed my mind. So, I wonder then fellas what kind of plan the Building Inspector Dept. eventually put in place to start the cleanup? Would anyone remember seeing these cars being hauled away or maybe remember the city eventually taking on a cleaner look?
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I was a little young when all that happened, so I don't have any real input to add. I do recall a buddy scavenging parts off some old cars that had been left for dead under the Dartmouth side of the Macdonald Bridge, but don't recall whether that was actually part of a metal recycling business or not.
In today's context, it seems a little strange to just leave cars beside railway tracks or on random empty lots (which is why I posted them), but times were different then... a little looser, a little less controlled. It would be interesting to speak with somebody who remembers the way it was...
One aspect of "the old days" is that recycling and re-use wasn't the fashionable virtue signalling it has become today - it was a necessity. As I remember it, many people didn't have much in the line of financial resources available to them, so they learned to repair their own stuff (coupled with the fact that the old stuff was more serviceable by the average person) - these abandoned cars were a source of parts for those who couldn't afford to buy new parts, and would enable them to keep their old cars on the road longer. IMHO, people were way more resourceful and practical than they are today (again, they were different times - it's hard to imagine the world without the connectivity that is common today, but it did happen, and it was definitely different).
FWIW, if you search for "abandoned cars" on the council minutes page, a number of hits come up. I didn't read through many of them, due to lack of time, but there were some from the later 1970s that might yield the info you are wondering about.
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