Shopping carts found under Janna Lee Avenue bridge on 6 March 2026.
There they were–18 shopping carts from COSTCO, Walmart, and Home Depot, in the creek and on its banks at Janna Lee Avenue bridge.
It brought back bad memories. It’s been over a decade since we found hundreds of Walmart carts embedded in Little Hunting Creek downstream from the bridge.
These carts are big, heavy, awkward, and almost impossible to remove once they become embedded in the mud of Little Hunting Creek. Debris dam up behind them, impeding water flows and creating trash dams.
Remember this pile of over 100 Walmart carts pulled out of the creek in 2012?
I had hoped those days were over.
Large numbers of shopping carts littering the creek and its banks degrade the community and despoil the creek and the environment.
Once volunteers manage to get them out of the creek, the carts require the county’s heavy-duty, costly equipment to haul them away.
After finding the carts, I spoke to the manager of the nearby COSTCO store.
He told me COSTCO has had over 500 carts stolen in recent months. They have had to hire on-lot security. Theft of carts is “unpreventable,” he said. Even stores whose carts have locking devices have carts stolen. COSTCO staff has to periodically venture out to recover large numbers of its carts from the vicinity.
COSTCO does not dispose of its carts, but rather refurbishes them. Clearly, losing and having to retrieve so many carts is a problem and headache for the retailer.
Past efforts to address the problem
Back in 2020, an Abandoned Shopping Cart Ordinance was introduced by Senator Scott Surovell and passed into law by the Virginia General Assembly (SB631).
It would have allowed the county to issue a Notice of Violation for abandoned shopping carts, and require the owner (COSTCO, Walmart, etc.) to clean them up or pay the cost for the county to do it.
The county never adopted the ordinance. The county Department of Code Compliance foresaw difficulties of enforcement and coordination among several county agencies, and recommended against adopting the ordinance. Instead, it recommended that the Board of Supervisors suggest new legislation requiring businesses to monitor, control, and prevent cart removal, and conduct outreach to encourage businesses to voluntarily implement abandoned cart prevention plans.
What’s to be done?
Are there mechanical means to effectively prevent theft of carts? If so, then the solution would seem to be to require the stores to develop an abandoned shopping cart prevention plan, as the Department of Code Compliance recommended in 2020. An approach that emphasizes prevention more than enforcement, and that puts the responsibility on the retailer to come up with a plan, seems reasonable.
If thefts are unpreventable by mechanical means, as the COSTCO manager suggests, the solution is less clear.
What can you do?
1. Email info@folhc.org with your ideas for how to solve this problem.
Maybe you have thought of a solution that nobody else has!
2. Contact your supervisor.
Little Hunting Creek flows through the districts of Supervisors Storck, Lusk, and McKay. Tell them that shopping carts DO NOT belong in Little Hunting Creek. Ask for their help to put a stop to it. We clearly need the county’s involvement to address this problem.
3. Volunteer to help in the next creek cleanup on April 11, 2026.
Until people stop throwing shopping carts in the creek and trash out of their car windows and down the storm drains, we’re stuck volunteering to clean it up.
