10:49am UK, Friday November 21, 2003

Fed up with litter-strewn streets? Berlin thinks it has found a solution - rubbish bins that say thank you.

Starting next spring, the German capital's refuse service will build electronics into a handful of the city's 20,000 street-side bins that will allow them to speak or sing to the public.

When bins talk back

City official Bernd Mueller said: "We want to encourage people in a nice, funny way to throw their trash in the baskets and not on the street.

The talking trash cans, powered by solar cells, are meant to show that Berlin is "a modern city with high-tech services, and that it is also very cosmopolitan", he added.

Making Berlin's visitors feel at home, some of the baskets will be programmed to say "thank you" or "merci" instead of "danke".

The talking bins will be installed at heavily visited sites such as the Reichstag, German Parliament building, and the central Friedrichstrasse train station.

But they will keep schtum after dark. Mr Mueller said: "Some people might feel uncomfortable if these things said something to them at night."

Instead, lights around the opening of the basket will glow green.