7 Reasons Recycling Isn’t Working in New York City

Jan 29, 2020 · 97 comments
me (here)
Why don't we put some of the burden on manufacturers? i.e. controls on packaging?
spenyc (NYC)
If memory serves, the city started the recycling project here on the Upper West Side because we were known to be environmentally aware and likely to follow the instructions. And I'll bet most of us did. That, however, was decades ago; millions of people at the least have moved in and out since then. The city needs to remind all its residents every few years of what the rules are. I still end up calling 311 every so often when I'm discarding something I'm not sure about, but not everybody knows whom to call or will deal with going to the NYC site online. A mass mailing of large postcards that could be saved for future reference would be better. Cards could include the sorting rules, the number/s to call for questions on what is recyclable, for days of pick ups, for pick-up requests, etc. Having the correct information at hand would significantly increase the amount and quality of recycling.
Common Sense (Brooklyn, NY)
Just like when Homer Simpson ran for Sanitation Commissioner in "The Simpsons", most NY'er abide by his campaign slogan - 'Can't someone else do it?' NY'ers, like so many progressives, talk a good talk but then when it comes to actually doing the right thing, they are far, far behind the curve. They don't want to make even the slightest extra effort in modifying their disposable, wasteful lifestyles in order to make this a better city, country, world. It's sad and infuriating to read how in NYCHA properties they can't manage to keep recycling in their buildings and then the residents can't even bother to walk a few hundred feet to a recycling area. Really?! What an absolutely depressing assessment of the residents, the workers and the management of NYCHA. We're wringing our hands over 'climate change' and we here in NYC can't even get to passable standards on waste disposal that other cities have already achieved. Good luck to us as a people.
Linda (Forest Hills, NY)
We get many mailings from cable companies wanting our business. I am constantly recycling all of these papers. Last week one billion dollar cable company sent a plastic coated card the size of a post card with their ad. Not plastic, not paper, not recyclable. Why is this allowed? Why aren’t businesses held up to much better standards. The burden should be on them not just the consumer.
Leo (Queens)
The city needs to have a huge marketing campaign towards educating the public on recycling. Even the most well-intentioned New Yorkers lack the proper know how when it comes to recycling. I see things like Styrofoam and containers full of food in recycling bins all the time. We have had successful campaigns against smoking in the past it is time to use a similar strategy to teach people how to recycle.
MsAz (Queens, NY)
I work in an office building in Midtown, where we have recycling bins and trash bins. When I work late I see the building porters collect trash and recycling, emptying both bins into one larger container. Someone brought this to our office admin's attention- turns out that the building as a whole doesn't recycle. So does the owner of an office building get fined, in this case? In can't be much of a fine, since it's been going on for a while. If it's not a significant fine, I'm not sure when/if the building management will ever correct their behavior.
Meighan Corbett (Rye, NY)
Here's another thought about recycling. There are not enough proper labeled bins everywhere. For instance there are huge crates on wheels for newspapers on the tracks in GCT. Hardly anyone reads a newspaper in physical form on the train so those are mostly empty to one third full. There's very few garbage cans, and no recycling bins for cans or bottles. Same on Park Avenue when you emerge at 48th street. A bin with a slot for newspapers, and cans, bottles, coffee cups jammed in the slot, no proper garbage and certainly no recycling bins. On side streets, where restaurants and businesses leave their garbage for pick up, there's garbage from passersby tucked in, homeless folks opening the bags looking for cans and bottles, and garbage blowing along the street. Definitely a mismatch of the containers to the current uses of materials.
Anne-Marie Hislop (Chicago)
I'm in Chicago. There are other issues in general. A big one is residents who "recycle" things like greasy pizza boxes. When such things are put into the recycle lot the whole thing must go to the secondary recycle market. So, if I spend time cleaning out my glass peanut butter jar, but it ends up in the bin with someone else's greasy box, my clean jar will go to the secondary or "dirty" market anyway because the whole lot is spoiled. My understanding is that such recycle is not actually as useful for real recycling. With China refusing to take it any more, there are warehouses full of the stuff just piling up. Then, too, for a while (a few weeks) my apartment complex "ended" recycling. When I sought out other sites, there were only two city sites: one far, the other closer one would have taken me about 40 minutes each way in city traffic just to dump my recycling in a city provided bin. Even I, who am a pretty dedicated recycler, would have found it difficult to sustain trips there, especially in winter. Thankfully, the program has been re-initiated where I live. The greasy pizza boxes, though, are still a problem.
LF (NY)
NYC should outlaw Amazon delivery. (It's huge cognitive dissonance seeing so much cardboard piled everywhere in a city of so many liberals, and a real gut-punch of understanding how often people fail to live the principles they espouse.) Making Amazon delivery illegal here would have enormous benefit in Manhattan, at least. First, retail jobs would be restored. Second, retail resurrection would re-liven our city streets, because it would regenerate the foot traffic and mixed use of building that has vanished as everything became even-more-high-priced purely residential blocks with no spaces to interact. Third, it would eliminate a ton of pollution from all the idling, pollution-spewing subcontractor trucks who now park on our streets and run underpaid contractors with handtrucks from their delivery-truck-as-hub parked-on-the-street spots, effectively taxpayer-subsidized parking whose lowered-cost-as-profit flows back up to Amazon.
PNBlanco (Montclair, NJ)
It's time to mandate that all packaging be made from biodegradable materials. The technology exists now. And it's cheaper in the long run.
San Francisco Peaks (Flagstaff, AZ)
Our recycle bin says "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle". Lately I have tried to reduce the amount of plastic bottles I consume and plastic bags I use. I buy my clothing at the thrift store and pretty much only buy 100% cotton and 100% wool. All vegetable waste gets composted outside in the garden. These steps probably will not save the planet, but I personally would rather do them than not do them.
Allen (Brooklyn)
Plastics is an aesthetics issue.  Other than that, it causes few problems. Sure, we are shown photos of and told stories about animals that are killed by plastics, but it's really a relatively small number and it certainly fits in with Darwinian evolution:  More animals are born than can survive; this is just another way that they can die.  Unnatural, you may say, but dead is dead and it leaves more food for others and they, themselves, become food for others. It may be sad when we look at an individual, but they are part of a whole: The Web of Life. We read articles about the great mass of the plastics in our landfills, but who really cares how much a landfill weighs?  It's certainly isn't enough to set the Earth off kilter. In NYC and environs, we covered the mounds with earth and made parks. There is a great gyre of plastics in the ocean.  So what?  (See about sea life and plastics above.)  Unaesthetic, perhaps, but very few people even see it and how different is it from the Sargasso's weeds? The plastics become safety zones for zooplankton. Little of it now comes from the U.S. as we ceased ocean dumping decades ago. The people who are incensed by these things are well-meaning but in terms of human or animal life it is a low priority; they should expend their energy on curtailing global warming which is a more immediate danger.
steve andrews (vermont)
Recycling pollutes more then not recycling but requires more landfill (a NIMBY problem). Washing recyclables, extra truck and sorting etc... Enough 'studies' show this. Recycling requires MORE energy (elec/gas) then not. Recycling is a religion for the uninformed.
Peter (Rhode Island)
As someone who grew up in NYC, it is a city that pretends to be progressive and especially pretends to be progressive on environmental issues, but most people and politicians don't care enough to make real positive change happen. The best example is alternate side parking. Every day, ticking agents descend on neighborhoods to write tickets and force a certain behavior (i.e., move a car or get ticketed). The city knows how to change things if it wants to -- education/signage and massive enforcement with monetary penalties. The city spends $1billion (and growing) in taxpayer money each year to collect and export it's trash. You would think that dollar amount would start getting City Hall's attention.
Alaina Z (NYC)
How much of our plastic actually gets recycled? I am generally pro-recycling, but I resent the implication in this article that the public is too stupid to be aware of the fact that the market for recycled plastic has crashed, and who knows if or when it will ever come back. And this bit of nonsense: "The cascading effects of not recycling enough — such as... garbage that must be trucked out of the city..." As if we aren't sending our "recyclables" out of the city anyway?
em em seven (Peoria)
"Recycling may be the most wasteful activity in modern America: a waste of time and money, a waste of human and natural resources." June 30, 1996 NY Times Magazine cover story
Lynn (NYC)
I vacillate between obsessiveness towards recycling (every single speck of paper... every takeout container.... empty votive candles...etc)... and giving up entirely. For example, I'd heard it said that, if a recyclables barrel/trash bag contains IMPROPERLY sorted items, that the DSNY will NOT take the time to sift through items and fix our recycling errors, and that instead, the ENTIRE contents go into a landfill. Assuming this is true, this likely means that MUCH of our recyclables end up in landfills. I know for a fact that many in my apartment building, and despite numerous notices, often put WRONG items in our recycling barrels. Then there's the question of HOW things are recycled... the process...the energy used...whether it's saving the planet or not, in the long run. Either way, all of this once again proves that, in the end, the biggest impact is made by our using LESS in the first place. Order takeout food delivery less often, and when you DO, say NO to plastic utensils (for the love of god...are people that lazy..that they'd rather get plasticware than have to wash one of their own silverware?) Buy second-hand clothing. It's usually better-made, better quality fabric, and offers much more unique design choices. (For those who say wearing second-hand clothing is 'gross', there are such things as washing machines and dry cleaners, and ....I assume you've slept in a hotel bed before? ;-)
J.I.M. (Florida)
Recycling is an empty gesture that does more to distract than it achieves for the environment. Recycling is a flawed idea that was promoted by the plastic and petroleum industries so that they could continue to produce vast quantities of plastic. As long as corporations are allowed to bribe elected officials there will be no substantive change in the behavior of corporations that profit from the environmental damage done by plastics.
William McCain (Denver)
This is ridiculous. A liberal east coast city should easily be able to force people and businesses to recycle. Maybe they can pay a fee for stuff turned in.
Kparker (Atlanta)
@William McCain NYC is liberal in the way it votes, not the way it acts.
Carlyle T. (New York City)
In my neighborhood a sub industry is raiding hi rise building garbage piles for cans and in the commercial build9gs ,cardboard some even now have their own vans for such. I presume they sell these recyclables but NYC get's zero funding from these groups that carry off the items before DEP gets them.
Jeff (NYC)
Yes - let’s blame the consumers. Not the industry that produced the plastics that never degrade. Industry makes it because it is cheaper, People buy it because it is cheaper and the planet picks up the tab. This is literally a garbage in, garbage out reality. Recycling is a joke - shaming people for not fixing industry’s sins. Shame on you. Packaging should not outlive the consumer. As for greenhouse gasses, those can actually be collected at the landfill. And clogged garbage chutes? - that is hardly a persuasive argument for recycling; non-recyclable garbage can also clog the chute. Perhaps everything that can’t be packaged better should be color coded to make recycling easier on the front and back end.
me (here)
@Jeff Yes, except more and more they make it more expensive because they are selling it to you, to us. Why did beans and grains packages go from simple plastic bags to triple thickness, air-locked 4-color printed...packages? You don't think that has anything to do with the price of beans?
JM (NY)
as always utter laziness in humanity on top of government incompetence to do anything besides click the LIKE button will be the undoing of the world as we know it before the end of this century
Rev. E. M. Camarena, PhD (Hell's Kitchen)
During the Giuliani Administration, the NY Times revealed that none of the city's trash was recycled. This is a slight improvement - but it's all just a "feel-good" program designed to make people feel less responsible for the enormous amount of trash we generate. By making citizens sort our trash we may ease our conscience but it remains mere placebo. https://emcphd.wordpress.com
dksmo (Somewhere in Arkansas)
@Gabe Public areas of San Francisco and Seattle are trash-filled open sewers. These are not environmentally responsible cities despite the virtue signaling from their elected officials.
Brunella (Brooklyn)
The proliferation of 'convenient' single serving items and over-packaged goods don't help matters either, they contribute mightily to the problem of waste — just look at how vegetables (esp. lettuces, and chopped/peeled items), baby food pouches (instead of glass jars), snack-packs, yogurt, etc are packaged now vs. a decade or two ago.
Susan (Maine)
The NYT should be all over this - page 1 every day. I had to listen to Mr. Blow scolding me about Thanksgiving (btw I have Native American and Mayflower ancestry) and I, and my neighbors, are committed re-cyclers (it's true, recycling is tedious), so why isn't the greatest (arguably) city on earth TOTALLY on board - I guess liberalism (tragically) is selective.
Nycdweller (Nyc)
Get rid of recycling bottles and cans so we can stop the homeless from picking through our garbage
Lynn (NYC)
@Nycdweller Wow. So you are more bothered by 'homeless' picking through your precious garbage?
Bruce1253 (San Diego)
Is NYC still dumping its trash in the ocean?
Shaun Eli Breidbart (NY, NY)
I can't remember the last time I was at a bar that didn't throw bottles directly into the trash. Shouldn't be too hard to find businesses that aren't recycling, and fine the hell out of them.
Kevin Greene (Spokane, WA)
According to an MIT researcher, trashing plastics is better than recycling them. Reuters: Recycling plastic uses up a lot of resources, and after all the hauling around, sorting, and processing of bottles and containers, it often ends up getting thrown away or burned. MIT business researcher Andrew McAfee says we’d be better off putting our plastic waste into well-managed landfills. He argues we should spend our “mental budget for thinking about the Earth on more high-impact changes,” like carbon taxes on major polluters and nuclear energy. https://www.businessinsider.com.au/mit-research-andrew-mcafee-says-recycling-is-useless-2019-10
Philip (NYC)
Fixing the city’s archaic garbage collection system is perhaps one most important step. We need to move on from the piles of black garbage bags piled on sidewalks and cowboy private collection companies to a system that is more organized, more transparent, and more in keeping with a 21st Century city that wants to actually tackle its garbage problem. The city’s garbage collection system seems to be permanently stuck in the 1970s.
PP (ILL)
This is shameful for the city that is the worlds financial center and where the wealthy are extremely wealthy and can afford such services. Homeowners and apartment buildings need to do better. The city is falling behind. Time to tax the rich.
Kparker (Atlanta)
Maybe you're just going about this the wrong way. If this was issue created by the Trump administration, hundreds of NYT readers would already be chiming in, demanding that something be done. Try blaming Trump and watch de Blasio and Cuomo spring into action.
Midwest Josh (Four Days From Saginaw)
The city that needs to recycle the most does it the least. Weak politics, weak enforcement of weak laws, a citizenry too weak willed to know better. Consumerism and convenience indeed..
joe Hall (estes park, co)
One of the biggest ongoing lies in the recycling industry is that we "recycle" plastic. We don't for the most part it goes thru the expense of being processed and then thrown away it's as simple as that. However when Americans are lied to they often will double down on the lie and hate the truth teller.
c (NY)
NYC apartments are small. Asking residents to have a bin for trash, a bin for cardboard, a bin for glass & cans, and a bin for composting is a tall order for most of us. Not to mention that setting aside scraps for composting invites unwelcome critters. Add to that the ever-changing guidelines for what can and cannot be recycled/composted, and it's no wonder that most folks just give up and toss everything in the trash. The city needs to simplify the program and recognize the challenges of small spaces if they want to improve participation.
Lynn (NYC)
@c Another person deflecting personal responsibility.... most NYC apartment buildings have recycling bins in communal areas, so no one is required to have multiple bins in their own actual apartments. And as for collecting items for composting, 'unwelcome critters' is a stereotype which some folks like to latch onto, again, to deflect any responsibility. If you properly collect and mix compost (browns with greens), and then drop-off that compost at least once per week, critters should not be an issue. There are apartment-sized compost bins with charcoal filters, and/or one can keep compost in takeout/storage containers in their fridge or freezer. There are compost dropoffs all over the city. That said though, I do agree that the City could make things easier for us. I do know they have finally started a compost pilot program, whereby brown bins are being provided and then picked up weekly, along with recycling pickup. But it will be a while before the brown bins are implemented across the entire 5 boroughs.
spenyc (NYC)
@Lynn Wow. Self-righteous much? Not everybody in NYC lives in "apartment buildings" with handy recycling in "communal areas." I rent an unrenovated 300-square-foot studio in an old brownstone where I *hang my recycling bags from the wall* because I have approximately 6 square feet of L-shaped floor space in there. Boy, if the Times would let me ... but I will simply say, check your privilege!
Randy L. (Brussels, Belgium)
Most of NYC’s problems are from the actions of Mr. Bloomberg.
ejb (Philly)
Point #5 is "Markets are bullish on recycled materials" Did you mean bearish? I don't understand this why "recycling isn't working" if there is high demand for recycled materials, which is my understanding of what it means for markets to be bullish.
Brunella (Brooklyn)
Based on my former building, a brownstone with 10 apartments, there were tenants too lazy to separate recycling properly — placing large boxes, unflattened, with all sorts of plastic packaging within, bathroom trash (repulsive) and bottles into the paper recycling bin; styrofoam, dirty containers with food still in them, and plastic bags into the metal/glass/plastic recycling bin. It took about ten minutes every day to fish items out of the recycling bins and flatten their boxes, just to be able to fit my own recycling in. Not to mention, people who didn't recycle at all, placing everything in the trash...
Dred (Vancouver)
Why does this not surprise me. Try leading by example.
Candida C'landestina (Purple-Dot-in-Ashland OR)
"Massive" recycling is a lie in Portland, Oregon, and San Francisco, too, as I watch street people contaminate compostable containers with garbage and trash in their relentless search for refundable bottles and cans. We still carefully sort our stuff, the right thing to do, but we know we're fools to spend the time, as it goes to landfills. Only the bottle and can pickers win.
Oliver Jean (San Francisco)
NYC is like a third worl country regarding trash disposal. They don’t even use bins for collection like everywhere else in industrialized countries. The sidewalks become temporary dumps on the night before collection. And in the summer? The smell, the horror! Very primitive.
Randy L. (Brussels, Belgium)
There are so many rules to recycling here in Belgium. I gave up on it. It’s not worth the effort when they just mark your bag and leave it behind because one item might be against the rules (see through bags). I just throw it all in the trash.
Omar Alan (Los Angeles)
Recycling, composting, and being “green” are activities that differ profoundly between different demographics, and have for many years, even where infrastructure is identical. But this is again the sort of hard truth the Times cannot bear to look into. As an African-American friend of mine said to me: “Recycling? That’s something white people do!” There’s a whole comedic booklet called “Stuff White People Like” that has been a great seller. Foremost among the “Stuff”: All things “green”. The attitude among many if not most members of certain groups is decidedly oppositional. Why? How to remedy? Those would be interesting pieces I’m sure The Times will jump on...Not.
That's my stapler (New Yorker)
@Omar Alan What is your point?
DanInTheDesert (Nevada)
About a year ago I visited New York for the first time since I lived there in the 90s. I was shocked to see how little the throw away culture had changed -- New Yorkers were still getting their coffee in disposable cups, delis would still give me twice the number of paper napkins I needed. I don't know what it will take to get people to change but a 10 cent fee on each paper coffee cup might be a place to start. One people get in the habit of bringing their own cup they can think about how to reduce consumption elsewhere.
That's my stapler (New Yorker)
@DanInTheDesert Aye Aye Danny! Hit them pocketbooks...it almost always makes a difference. As you state, the conversation needs to be focused on decreasing consumption of offending items, if appropriate disposal is too hard to figure out.
Carlyle T. (New York City)
@DanInTheDesert People don't even pick up a dime dropped on the sidewalk in NYC it is as if one charged for that aforementioned coffee cup just one penny.
Sara G2 (NY)
RE: composting - if you live or work near a NYC farmer's market, you can bring your food scraps to them for composting. I keep mine in a large plastic salad container in the freezer during the week.
That's my stapler (New Yorker)
@Sara G2 The question Sara is, whether the compost gets disposed as it should, or at all. The question is, whether being a good citizen and separating your trash makes a difference to the city and the larger planet, makes a dent? The consumer is only one link in the chain.
Frank (Chapel Hill)
There Is a classic book (and website) that explains how to change environmental behavior. Google Doug McKenzie-Mohr. Highly recommended. Cities need to convince residents, businesses and landlords to cooperate, both in collection and in purchasing recycled content products. It’s all about psychology.
Prodigal Son (Sacramento, CA)
The two main problems with recycling are: 1) every municipality has different rules, and 2) it only takes one recycle ignorant or recycle care-less person to spoil a whole bin of material. The only good universal solution is single stream: all waste all recycling goes in one bin and is sorted at the facility. Some recycling prophets cringe at single stream claiming it desensatizes us to the problem, but what is the goal? Making everyone have a Phd in recycling or recyling as much as possible?
F R (Brooklyn)
Why is it even legal to sell merchandise padded in styrofoam and inflated plastic bags if it can’t be recycled in most US cities?
Dante (NJ)
@F R Money money money
Be Bop (Washington DC)
I briefly lived in London where homes and flats had easy to access recycling bins, and you did not have to do much in the way of sorting things. There were separate trucks that picked up recycled goods from the regular trash. It took very little effort to recycle, and it just a natural habit amongst residents to recycle. The key words are convenience and education where it just becomes second nature to recycle. If our cities and towns made it a priority and spent the money to have a user friendly system in place like our European counterparts we wouldn't have this problem. It would just be done, as people would cooperate if it wasn't so inconvenient to recycle!
Global Charm (British Columbia)
The key to successful recycling is infrastructure. In the building where I work, there are bins for sorting: paper, containers and organics. We also have a container for trash, but a surprising amount of “trash” can be composted, especially when containers from restaurants must now be compostable, and single-use plastic bags are banned. The janitors bring the waste to separate bins near our loading dock. Separate truck collections take the waste to the appropriate processing facilities. Space for separated waste streams should be mandatory in all new construction. Among other things, this makes the recycling process visible to the stakeholders, and easier to police should this be necessarily. There is an aesthetic dimension to sustainability. Part of it is expressed in one’s choice of food and clothing, but part of it is also expressed in the systems we create around us, and the respect we show to the people who work in them.
Clotario (NYC)
Regarding the composting effort, I initially was terrifically excited as I have forever been a at-home composter. When it reached my neighborhood I diligently composted properly and with enthusiasm, and made efforts to get others to do so as well. A few years later an article came out revealing that all compost had been going to the landfill anyway, since the "composting" facility had been out of commission. What was the facility, you ask? An incinerator. I have attempted to find numbers of what compost goes to what purpose, to no avail. Statements, as here, about how composting "can" be turned to fertilizer etc., combined with a lack of transparency do not leave me hopeful that much has changed.
zoey30 (tucson, arizona)
Most cities with a higher recycling rate use the blue barrel program. This allows all recyclables to be placed in a large container without the need to sort. Our recycling plant automatically sorts out paper, plastic, etc. with fewer workers needed on the line to sort through non recyclables. The larger, 30, 60 or 90 gallon blue barrels can be picked up automatically by the recycling trucks without the need to have laborers come out to collect each bin. This is a more cost effective approach for the municipality and also prohibits theft. Our city had problems before we switched to the blue barrel with folks stealing the valuable commodities (such as aluminum cans & cardboard) from the smaller, sorted bins. Education is key in increasing recycling rates and in encouraging proper recycling habits.
Rudy Hopkins (Austin Texas)
@zoey30 There are now good compostable packing pellets similar to styrofoam but made of corn-based organic material. Same with cups, utensils and compostable paper bags. In Austin, composting is a smashing success for me and quite easy. It eliminates 70% of my trash. One note: maybe consider intermittent site monitoring of recyclable blue can for basic adherence to easy standards. Higher ratings on standards gives lower fee for collection services marginally to incentivize reasonable responsibility and better neighbor compliance with keeping the flow channeled in everyone's interest and the environments interest as well?
Leslie (New York, NY)
If you live in a large city and get around on foot or via public transportation, your ability to recycle is fundamentally different from those who drive most places. We city dwellers regularly carry around tote bags full of stuff… much of it needed to avoid acquiring another item made of plastic. But that said, there is almost no way to avoid all single-use containers, without loading yourself down to the point of impacting every aspect of your life. Do I feel bad when I buy too many groceries to fit into my reusable tote bag? Of course. But I can’t throw my grocery items loose into the trunk of my car. I don’t have a car. And besides, I’m pretty sure my carbon footprint is a lot smaller than people who drive most places. New York City needs to invest in ways to “melt” or manage our plastic waste without complicated separation schemes, because giving up plastic isn’t realistic.
Jt (Brooklyn)
Shame the composting drive was not done with an educational introduction. My Landlord promptly rolled away our new brown bin never to be seen again after I explained to him what it was for. Other neighbors ignore them or line them with thick plastic bags - every neighborhood should have a drop off site for ALL organic waste as well as cans and bottles, educators posted there to teach everyone the ‘how and why’ .
HT (NYC)
I have always wondered whether the public housing areas are sufficiently serviced by recycling. This indicates that they are not. But in a larger context, controlling recycling would be depend upon the ability to identify those that are not recycling or doing it poorly. In any multi family building, that would depend on the building staff. Which shifts the burden and costs to others. And makes identifying miscreants difficult. In a city, where everyone spends all of their time crawling over one another, garbage is the least of the issues.
Laura (Utah)
If people are serious about catastrophic climate change, reducing waste and landfill acquisition, then getting the citywide composting project going is a very good thing. Gardening is not only a hobby, it can save the world, and it doesn't even require growing plants. Making compost is really easy, and when we consider how much food waste is in our landfills, it makes a lot of sense. Plus paper and cardboard can be composted. I don't deny it takes space, which means NYC would have to supply convenient locations to drop on most every block, but the benefit is immediately obviously: real reductions in landfill waste. I have reduced my garbage to less than one full bag per week for a family of four by composting everything that can be composted and recycling everything I can recycle (except plastics numbering 3 or higher which cannot be recycled at this time). It is truly amazing to see my neighbors overflowing trash cans each and every week, while I drag my can out every other week with my two bag nestled inside. Plus, I get the most amazing soil amendment, which costs me nothing more than a little elbow grease. There are rooftops all over NYC begging for gardens. A citywide composting project could provide the soil needed for growing its way to cleaner air and less warming.
K Hunt (SLC)
@Laura I live in Salt Lake County too. The Wasatch Front Waste & Recycling District which covers 13 cities on the WF takes all plastic containers # 1 - 7. Ask your City to join the District. I am assuming Ace is your provider and they did not diversify their brokers years ago.
Laura (Utah)
@K Hunt Nice to meet you! I live in Summit County, where we also have an exceptional recycling center, which also takes in all kinds of used items for resale; they are taking recycling to new levels. The problem is the county curbside recycling mixes all the plastic together in one bin, and it is these mixed plastics that are piling up and eventually end up in landfills. I clean 1 & 2 and then drop it off at the center; all the other types will end up together in a huge mixed bale of unclean plastics floating around on a container ship or barge in the Pacific looking for a dump. It's like you can't win for losing. Recycling plastic is a cruel lesson in a never ending and enlarging carbon footprint for mostly single use items. EGAD! After spending time in Mexico and seeing first hand how completely unprepared developing nations are equipped to deal with any waste, let alone plastic waste, I'm doing my level best not to buy it, which is dang hard and more costly when it can be accomplished.
anae (NY)
New York City USED to let us know exactly what to recycle. Every few years they sent out a page that summarized what to recycle and what color bag/bin to put it in. You could stick on your fridge if you wanted to. But now? Recycling is a mystery. You're still expected to do it - or get fined by sanitation - but there are no instructions. Do I have to rinse everything out first? Some sources claim lids and caps arent recyclable. Are they? And what am I supposed to do with those canisters that are both cardboard AND metal? I'm not strong enough to pull them apart. The city wants you to go online and watch their videos. I don't have time for that. Just send me a little poster so I know what to do.
Antonio (Brooklyn)
Several things occur to me when I think about garbage, which is often: 1. We'd probably be much better about it, if we actually had to put it somewhere close by, instead of shipping out for other people and places to deal with. Right now, it's out of sight, out of mind. 2. It's not too hard to sort trash properly, yet a casual stroll down my block of 1-3 family homes on any given trash pickup day proves that most people either don't know what they're doing or simply don't care. And, everyone seems to be producing a lot more trash than they did 30 years ago, despite all this lip service about the environment. 3. Waste transfer stations (mentioned in the article) operated by private companies don't sort a single thing as far as I can tell and they are the places that most building contractors, landscapers, private carters, and even the City itself take their refuse to, including many items that can and should be recycled (not to mention many items, e.g. chemicals, electronics, etc. that should not go to landfills). Why aren't these entities better regulated by the city?
DD (LA, CA)
Consumers should pay more to throw out their trash and ensure recycling but businesses will help the solution. Amazon should be required to take any and all of their packing material back when delivering new boxes to residents.
LHSechrist (St, Louis)
A primary issue that is overlooked in the article is the manufacturer's/ seller's/ store's/ restaurant's responsibility for packaging and recycling. Source reduction (buy less, package less, ship less) is needed to minimize the amount of waste produced. Manufacturers need to provide packaging that can easily be recycled. Extended Producer Responsibility in Europe requires manufacturers to manage packaging after consumer use. We as consumers need to demand less packaging, less plastic and less waste from producers, stores and restaurants. The burden should not be on the consumer to figure this out.
Nadine (NYC)
The NYC housing authority responds more to federal rules than local ordinances. More blue bins is a great inexpensive idea. Anything that has a triangle should be recycled not just plastic water bottles, glass or paper. Plastic water bottles have cash value in that they can make carpets, for example. Most buildings don't recycle dairy containers, don't understand it. Remixing would never happen if the trash had monetary value and more drop-off sites were established. The 91 st east river way station loads barges after trucks unload. Did the author go there. I am sure they don't remix since they have recycling collection.
zoey30 (tucson, arizona)
@Nadine Unfortunately, not everything that has a triangle is recyclable. The triangle merely indicates what type of plastic the container is comprised of. The vast majority of municipalities collect only nos. 1 & 2 plastics.
Lilly (New York, NY)
My landlord, in a private building in the Bronx, refuses to put out recycling bins, saying it will cost him too much money. Not surprisingly, he doesn't do anything because of that excuse. For months I was walking my recycling a to a grocery store with a bin out front, afraid my street neighbors might be bothered by my using theirs. Eventually, I caved and ended up asking my neighbor if I could use theirs. With an incredulity at my landlord's lack of care, they said yes. Finally, I have a convenient place, but the rest of the people in my building just throw it in the trash. Mr. Landlord has been reported to the city and they've done absolutely nothing in terms of fines to help rectify this. No idea what to do.
fFinbar (Queens Village, nyc)
@Lilly When I picked up three large bags of compost from the DEP last year (30-120# each, I forget the exact weight of the bags, but they were large and heavy), they had composting info and a decal to put on the brown composting bin that reads "Share my bin!" Even though it advises "sharers" not to include regular garbage, I have been reluctant to use it for two reasons: 1. We only use the brown bin in the growing season for yard waste; everything organic from the house ends up in our composting heap in the back yard; and 2. Despite the warning not to use it for garbage, as pointed out in many of these comments, there are people who just don't care. So, if someone misuses my "shared" organic bin for other than organic material, guess who gets the summons. A risk I would rather not take. On another note, any suitable cardboard shipping container is reserved, filled with paper recycles, tied up, and put out. Shoot, even cat food boxes (the ones than hold 24 to 36 individual cans) can contain a lot of junk mail and be put at the curb. Speaking of which, I have a box to tie up right now for tomorrow's pick up. TTFN.
Concerned Mother (New York Newyork)
There is no obvious site anywhere that I can find that says what kind of item is recyclable and what not, nor how to separate them properly. Other cities have single stream recycling, which would make this process much, much easier. Help, please!
Antonio (Brooklyn)
@Concerned Mother The NYC Department of Sanitation's website (explains quite clearly the city's recycling rules... it's not too hard to find out basic info these days.
MB (New York, NY)
Patrick (NYC)
Something I constantly wonder as I ‘scrub my yogurt container’ is how much water is used doing so which my building owner then pays for. It seems like a measurably not insignificant percentage of my daily water consumption is going toward making empty mayo, ketchup and sour cream jars reusably clean. Times that by millions of households. Shouldn’t the burden be placed on the recycling company to have industrial scrubbers that can do this with out such a massive expenditure of our precious water supply? I bet they do re-clean all their shredded plastic and crushed glass anyway.
Jennifer (Atlanta, GA)
@Patrick Get a dog/cat. I have found they really help with clean-up and water conservation at the same time. (I jest, but not really!)
Patrick (NYC)
@Jennifer Unlike Atlanta, here in NYC, few of us have back and front yards to toss all those empty squeezables for Fido to play with. ( I jest, but not really!)
Mike (Astoria, NY)
@Jennifer My dog hates mayo.
asterios (Washington Heights)
It's interesting that most of the story focuses on "collection" issues. I also really want to hear more about how NYC is doing on processing the materials that are successfully collected. If I put out a pristine bag of correctly sorted, rinsed materials, what will happen to it? Does it definitely get recycled? (Next, when somebody puts out a less pristine bag, how well can the city deal with that.) We've heard a lot about China's shifting policy on taking recyclables, but I've never seen anything about how that specifically impacts NY. So, as Mayor Koch used to say, how're we doin?
Steven (Brooklyn)
@asterios Excellent point and something I too wonder and cannot understand why none of the stories on this topic so far have clearly broached this critical question.
Gabe (Elkins Park, PA)
It's incredible to me that this article neglects to mention the aspect MOST important in any area to its recycling success: its people and their culture. The author compares NYC's failures with the success of Seattle or San Francisco as if the only difference between these cities are their city councils. But the residents of Seattle are, far and away compared to NYC, well-educated, middle class, environmentally conscious. To write an article like this without considering the actual residents of the area is silliness.
Patrick (NYC)
@Gabe With all those months of rain, many are also morbidly depressed. You see it all the time in their comments.
Susan L. (New York, NY)
We live in a huge co-op building, and presumably most of the residents are somewhat educated & aware. However, I could never prove that hypothesis by looking at the (purported) recycling area. There's absolutely *no way* that approximately 300 apartments generate so little recycling. I realize I'm rather obsessive about this issue - but still....
Andy Deckman (Manhattan)
Ah the old recycling panacea. Consume as much as you want, put it in the blue bin and you’re absolved! NYCHA issues will be solved if only they’d recycle! And now, don’t worry about that food waste, we’re going to compost it - at an expensive loss. It was all believable until China stopped accepting our waste (er recyclables) - I guess shipping waste half way around the world wasn’t actually sustainable. None of this sounds very sustainable. The fact is it is an unmetered utility and the moment it goes in the trash/recycling bin, New Yorkers don’t pay it a second thought. (“Not my problem!”) Fee for service is of course the solution but would be a regressive tax on poor New Yorkers so let’s find out what’s more sacred to our politicians: environmentalism or progressive tax policy.
Polaris (North Star)
"New Yorkers consider the ability to have pretty much anything delivered, within days if not hours, to be a virtual right" This is even more true in San Francisco and Seattle, where most of these tech-based delivery companies were founded and are headquartered. Yet those cities are way far ahead of NYC in waste management.
Simone (Williamson)
I want to add something that I found shocking. I worked in a large corporate law firm in Manhattan for years, the kind of office that prints reams and reams of paper (most of it unnecessary). Shockingly, this firm (and I later found out most firms of the same size) do NOT recycle this paper. Instead, because of strict adherence to client confidentiality requirements, the is collected in separate bins (i.e. not the trash or the recycling), and then taken to a shredder. Even more shocking, the results of the shredding is then put in the TRASH, because apparently that is more "secure" than recycling. It is a colossal waste of paper and made me sad to witness. There has to be a solution.
Laura (Utah)
@Simone There's an easy answer to this one, add the shredded paper to the compost pile. In a matter of hours it will be unreadable, and in a matter of days, it will be soil amendment.
Jennifer (Atlanta, GA)
@Simone That's surprising that the shred firm doesn't recycle it. Here in Atlanta, shredded paper still gets you rebates, making it much more economical than tossing in the landfill. Someone's losing money.
K Hunt (SLC)
@Simone Any material less than an inch in size is called a fine and falls through the screens for the landfill. In addition, shredded materials get caught with other materials at MRF for contamination issues.
peter bailey (ny)
It won't be convenient when NYC goes under water from rising oceans. New Yorkers, and everyone, should long and hard about what future they want for their kids and their kids kids, etc. It is not that hard to do the right thing. For example, it takes a lot less effort than abandoning NYC.