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Originally Posted by Wonderboy
Good post Frankly. I love talking about garbage/recycling, I love recovering garbage/recycling and (re)using it. Sometimes I'd like to do it all day. Not even garbage, but foraging in general. I love learning about edible wild plants and mushrooms. Scavengers and parasites generally get a bad or negative image attached to them. I think they are awesome and play an integral role in the grand scheme of things, and could do to be emulated a bit.
Every municipality deals with garbage collection differently and sometimes it's ingrained enough for it to be really difficult to change. My city began using special bags in the mid 90s for garbage collection to great success. They are sold at local stores where garbage bags are sold, and are priced to cover the cost of collection. The more waste you produce, the more bags you must buy and the more you'll recycle or reuse - this (in theory) eliminates that frustration you encounter by having to pay the same as your highly wasteful neighbors. (there are always people who are going to complain about having to pay for ANYTHING). The grand hope is that people will eventually steer away from buying things with excessive packaging, or packaging at all.
I actually work for public works in my city now, and I'm in a reasonably good position to propose ideas related to garbage collection, and I'm seeing what we can do about a transfer station swap shop to create a space for perfectly good items to be diverted from the landfill, creating a centralized repository of curb loot. Google transfer station swap shop - it's awesome. |
When I was a kid I was torn between wanting to be a garbage man or a brain surgeon when I grew up.
My city has had the special printed bags for at least 19 years that I know of.
I wintered in California last year and OMG I should have taken a pic of their waste swap shop... with an ocean view!!!!
I retrieved the boards I put on my cycle hauling trailer there and were I not prepping to go x-country at the time I could have dragged a LOT more goodies back home!!! Oh to have something like that here!