1. The cost of the trash bags relative to median income in some neighborhoods was too high. When a 5 pack of bags is $9 and you earn $7.25/hour before taxes, it is suddenly not that easy to justify doing the right thing when the free thing is possible.
2. People lived in apartment buildings and multi family homes so there is no easy identification of who exactly leaves a car battery or a mattress on the sidewalk at 3am. Having cops watch all the streets all the time for this wouldn’t work and neighbors don’t want to bother watching each other.
3. Because people didn’t earn that much relative to cost of living, high fines would just throw poor people in jail while those who can afford the bags can just buy the bags. So you’d still have trash on the streets but also cause people who can least afford it to lose their jobs by making them miss work.
4. Minor point but where you buy the bags matters. It was highly inconvenient that you couldn’t buy them at grocery stores. Instead you had to literally go out of your way to go to sketchy convenience stores and liquor stores instead.
Plenty of people used the bags but there were enough who didn’t that it made the city dirty. And once you get used to seeing trash on the street you are a lot less likely to think twice about contributing to it yourself.
