Litter along a riverbank can go unnoticed for months – until someone decides to count it. On 23 July 2026, at 2:30 PM, we met the Kyriba team on a stretch of the Warsaw Vistula riverbank between Poniatówka and the Świętokrzyski Bridge to do exactly that – to collect everything that had gathered in the grass, in the riverside bushes, and under the benches. The result of that shared afternoon of work is 30 bags of waste that will never reach the river, a bird’s nest, or the stomach of a fish.
The Vistula as the heart of Warsaw – why clean riverbanks matter
The Vistula flows through Warsaw for more than a dozen kilometers and is one of the few large, still largely natural river corridors within the boundaries of a major European city. Its sandy sandbars, riverside thickets, and slopes are home to plover birds, fish, and insects – but they are also where residents relax, walk, and spend their summer afternoons. The area around Poniatówka is one of the most visited stretches of riverside beach in the city, which means that every summer this bank carries an especially heavy footfall – and with it, a growing amount of litter left behind.
What is left in the grass after a picnic or an evening with friends rarely disappears on its own. A plastic bottle can take up to 450 years to break down in the environment, a single cigarette butt can contaminate as much as 40 liters of ground or surface water, and glass, for all practical purposes, never decomposes at all. Waste left on the riverbank is not a static problem – spring meltwater, heavy rain, and rising water levels wash it straight into the riverbed. From there it ends up in the digestive systems of fish and waterbirds, breaks down into microplastic, and travels on, all the way to the Gulf of Gdańsk and the Baltic Sea, of which the Vistula is the largest freshwater tributary. Cleaning a riverbank in Warsaw is therefore not only about tidying the view from the capital’s windows – it is a real contribution to the health of the entire river basin, right down to where it meets the sea.
It is also worth remembering that the green areas along the Vistula act as a natural buffer – they filter water running off from the city, protect the slopes from erosion, and offer shelter to animals that would otherwise have nowhere left in the middle of a large city. A littered riverbank is not just an aesthetic problem; it is a real threat to this small but valuable pocket of nature in the heart of the capital. That is why an action like this one with the Kyriba team carries a meaning that goes beyond simple tidying – every bag collected is a bag that will not travel further downstream.
Organic waste, such as food scraps or fruit pits, might seem less harmful than plastic, but in excess it disrupts the natural balance of microorganisms in the soil and in the water near the shore, while food wrappers and snack packaging can sit in the same spot for years before they break down enough to blend into their surroundings. For the birds that nest along the Vistula – and dozens of species do – every scrap of plastic or string caught in the vegetation is a potential hazard once it ends up woven into a nest or mistaken for food. Regularly cleaning stretches like the one between Poniatówka and the Świętokrzyski Bridge genuinely eases that pressure – and even though the effect is not permanent, since the area needs recurring care, every such intervention gives both nature and residents a real breathing space.
What the cleanup looked like
We met on 23 July, right at 2:30 PM, on the designated stretch between Poniatówka and the Świętokrzyski Bridge – a section of riverbank chosen for its popularity among Varsovians and for the visible signs of heavy use after months of the summer season. The group spread out along the designated area to systematically comb through the grassy slopes, the riverside thickets, and the space around the benches and spots where residents most often rest.
Cleaning up green spaces looks simpler than it actually is. Waste hides in dense vegetation, gets tangled in roots and grass, and some of it – broken glass or metal fragments – requires extra care to collect safely. Participants worked methodically, moving along the designated stretch of land, checking one section of the slope and shoreline after another, until, once the whole stretch had been covered, the area between Poniatówka and the Świętokrzyski Bridge looked entirely different from how it had looked at the start of the afternoon.
It is precisely the simplicity of this kind of action that gives it its strength – no specialized equipment or training is needed to genuinely ease the pressure on the river and its surroundings. All it takes is a group of people willing to give up a few hours, and a bit of method in how they approach the designated area.
Kyriba in action – participants and partnership
14 people from Kyriba took part in the cleanup – a team that chose to give up its own time for the environment as part of corporate volunteering. More and more companies are recognizing that environmental volunteering is more than a one-off team-building event – it is a concrete, measurable value for the local community and for nature, and along the way it builds relationships within a team in a way that a typical corporate outing or a meeting at a desk simply cannot.
The One More Tree Foundation has been working for years with companies that want their social engagement to have a tangible, ecological dimension. We combine tree planting, environmental education, and green-area cleanups across Poland and Europe with the real needs of specific places – in this case, the Warsaw riverbank of the Vistula, which, after the summer season, needed exactly this kind of intervention. The Kyriba team’s involvement shows that meaningful change does not always require large-scale organization – fourteen people with a clearly defined goal and a few hours of shared work were enough to make a difference visible to the naked eye by the end of the same day.
We would like to thank the entire Kyriba team for the time, energy, and commitment they put into this action. It is thanks to partnerships like this one that we are able to keep carrying out further work for Warsaw’s nature, and to look after places that thousands of residents of the capital visit every day.
30 fewer bags of litter – results and summary
The afternoon’s tally comes to 30 bags of waste collected from the stretch of Vistula riverbank between Poniatówka and the Świętokrzyski Bridge. Each of these bags is litter that will not end up in the water during the next rainfall, will not be swallowed by a waterbird, and will not break down into microplastic drifting in the current. This is an effect that can be measured in numbers, but whose full value cannot be reduced to a bag count alone – it is also a cleaner stretch of the city for everyone who spends time by the Vistula, and a clear signal that this Warsaw riverbank has people looking after it.
The 23 July action is yet another proof that cooperation between business and environmental organizations can produce results that are visible immediately, on the very same afternoon. The Kyriba team showed that a few hours of shared work can genuinely change a piece of urban nature – and leave behind something more than just the memory of a corporate outing.
Actions like this also show how much depends on plain consistency and the willingness to step out of the office for a few hours. There is no need for a large budget or complicated logistics – just a group of people ready to walk a designated stretch of riverbank and consistently collect whatever they find along the way. It is out of small actions like this one that the long-term improvement in the condition of a river and its surroundings is built.
If your company would like to organize a similar action along the Vistula or anywhere else in Poland, we invite you to get in touch with the One More Tree Foundation. Together we will find the area that needs this kind of intervention the most, and plan an action tailored to your team’s capacity and schedule.
Thank you again to the Kyriba team for a shared afternoon by the Vistula – for 14 pairs of hands thanks to which the stretch between Poniatówka and the Świętokrzyski Bridge looks completely different today than it did before 23 July. It is a good example of how caring for the environment does not have to be an abstract slogan – it can take a very concrete shape: a time and place to meet, a designated stretch of riverbank, and 30 bags that will never travel further downstream.
