Andy Sward doesn’t want to burst our Whistler bubble, but he comes bearing some bad news.
“I hate to say it, but … on my first trip up there this time last year—for Earth Day—I posted on my Million Bottle Pledge Instagram and Facebook page, ‘This might be the dirtiest highway in Canada,’” he said.
If anyone knows the state of trash along the country’s highways, it’s Sward. The Coquitlam man has run across Canada—coast to coast—three times picking up trash along the way since 2013. In total, that’s added up to 28,909 kilometres and 128,113 bottles, cans and single-use cups.
His goal is to reach 1 million.
At his current rate, however, that won’t happen until he’s 104 years old. So, he’s asking for help.
While COVID-19 foiled his plans for a cross-Canada run last year, Sward is hoping to use “Earth Week” as a chance to warm up for the journey this summer. When he spoke to Pique on Friday, April 16, his plan was to leave his home in Coquitlam on the weekend, run 40 km a day and make his way up to Whistler by Thursday night to mark Earth Day before carrying on to Pemberton and Mount Currie.
His hope: Communities along the way will help him pick up litter to add to his total count and chip away at his goal of 1 million pieces of trash collected.
“The more people who do get up and clean, or share it, or talk about it, eventually it will reach [the people littering] and hopefully they’ll stop,” Sward said.
His Whistler friends Yohann Barelli and Amanda Steel planned to do a sweep of that section of the highway to collect trash ahead of time, meaning whatever is on the road by the time Sward comes through will be freshly tossed—either intentionally or by accident—by recent travellers.
Sward is entirely self-sufficient, using a running stroller to push his camping and personal gear with bags attached to the sides to collect the trash. He also uses a clicker, like the kind you’d see the doorman at a bar use to count patrons, to count trash collected.
People pull over all the time to ask him what he’s doing. “Anybody who pulls over and chats will want to hear the story and want to know what’s going on, especially if they see me clean up trash in their community,” he said.
To that end, he’s made friends across the country over his three trips. In non-COVID-19 times, he would stay with them for a bit of reprieve from the road.
“Before the pandemic came along, I would never have to go a week to 10 days before staying at a friend’s house,” he says. “I’d rest up, take a day off, they’d feed me and send me off.”
It sounds like an impossible feat, but Sward said he’s driven by a love of his country, a desire to draw attention to the amount of litter we create and how many single-use items we consume, and the pull of the journey.
In 2019, his last trip, which started in Tofino and ended in Cape Spear, Nfld., took seven months. The rest of the year he worked as much as he could in the restaurant business to support his efforts.
“I’ve had so many people tell me, ‘I wish I had the time to run across Canada or do what you do,’” he said. “I have two nieces and many friends with young children—some with new babies this year—I figure since I don’t have to be responsible for my own children … I’ll try to make this country, this planet better for [those kids].”
To follow Sward on his journey—and to log your own cleanup efforts to help him reach his goal—visit millionbottle.com, facebook.com/millionbottlepledge, or Instagram.com/millionbottlepledge.
Earth Day panel discussion
The Association of Whistler Area Residents for the Environment (AWARE) is hosting a panel discussion on Earth Day, April 22, to consider lessons learned during the pandemic and look ahead to how we can do better moving forward.
The free event will include Mike Douglas, from Protect Our Winters (POW) Canada, Danielle Kristmanson of Origin, and Johnny Mikes from Coast to Cascade Grizzly Bear Alliance.
It’s set to take place from 7 to 8:30 p.m. on Zoom. Register at awarewhistler.org.
