Reva McAulay
12.3.12
MHC 200
Weekly Response #13
It’s astonishing that 75% of New York City’s garbage is not residential. I mean, yes, there is a lot of business and construction and what-not around, but that they create three times as much trash as New York’s 8 million residents is amazing. Having garbage processed in-borough makes sense in terms of fairness, and not having garbage trucks driving all over the city wasting gas and creating traffic. However, where it doesn’t necessarily make as much sense is in the case of Manhattan. If the proposed facility works out that that’s great, but if they can’t find a suitable location, fairness is not enough of a reason to shove a waste transfer station where one won’t fit. It might be fair to the borough as a whole, but not to the people living there which is what matters more. If there is a site in another borough where the waste transfer station might effect far fewer people, that would be fair in a different way. I’m still somewhat confused as to how one station on E 91st St. is going to replace the 22 in Brooklyn where Manhattan’s waste is currently sent.
As for Tullytown, hopefully soon they won’t need to take our trash, although it seems they might miss it (or at least the money that comes with it). Then again, the radioactive sludge might make up for it. Hopefully New York will follow San Francisco’s lead and transition towards a zero-waste system. They’re success is honestly greater than I would have expected possible, but luckily I see no reason why it should work there but not here. That’s if the government decides to do it, and actually spend the money instead of half ass it. Putting recycling cans next to every single trashcan would be a nice start. An even better one would be recycling all plastic/metal/glass instead of the byzantine system we have now. Adding a citywide composting program would be interesting since that does not seem to be a thing that is even on most people’s radar. It might take a little while for people to get used to the idea, but it’s not that hard. The good thing about all those changes is that they just cost money, they don’t bother people. Fining people who don’t recycle might not go over so well, but they could frame it as a way to recoup some of the costs for the people who do recycle. Banning non-recyclable products would be even harder (and if they can’t get that in San Francisco, what are the odds here?). I still think charging for waste pick up would be a more palatable and more effective solution, although it would still be tricky. Another idea would be subsidizing commercial recycling and/or taxing commercial waste disposal, seeing as that seems to be the majority of the problem.
The ads were great, hopefully we’ll get a chance to see the rest of them. The government’s ads are usually pretty good but I can’t think of any really attention grabbing ones regarding anything environmentally conscious. The ones about smoking and the amount of fat and sugar in energy drinks are certainly striking and everybody notices them, but the ones encouraging recycling and reducing you’re energy use are boring. The ones you guys made are definitely much better; it’s too bad the city doesn’t put the same amount of creativity into theirs. Showing people that kind of representation of how much garbage this city actually produces might make them think about where it goes and how they contribute to it. And maybe that would cause more of a change in habits and actions than the bland banners that show how consumers can reduce their energy use.
