Do Better, NYC
Everyone who writes or speaks about New York City—either about how they’ve imagined it or how they’ve experienced it—makes mention of the smell. I won’t deny that the city lends itself easily to this observation, especially in the humid summers and on the subway platforms. Though for the most part, I have probably grown nose-blind to it.
The problem, as one might assume, is trash. Garbage. Waste. Whatever you want to call it. On pick-up days it’s piled several black bags high along sidewalks, and when they are ultimately lifted up, a strange, stinky stain remains, evidence of rancid seepage.
It is what it is. People these days, in general, produce too much trash. Myself included. But there is one thing I have noticed, a change to which might help the issue, even a little bit: NYC is, for the most part, missing recycling bins.
Apparently, NYC only recycles about one-fifth of its total garbage, which is a lower percentage than that achieved by many other major cities in the US. Well, maybe NYC needs to make it easier for the average person to participate in the efforts. Too many times I have stepped off the subway after a run in the park and tossed my empty Gatorade bottle into a metal trash can on the corner, because I had no other option. It pains me to not be able to recycle even the most obvious of contenders. It pains me to know that my bottle will become one with the pizza boxes and cigarettes that had no chance to begin with.
If there were more recycling bins on street corners, right beside the trash, not only would more overall waste be recycled, but fewer trash cans would become that erupting volcano of rubbish that people try and tamp down over and over and over again just to fit another Starbucks cup, only for the overflow to remain fierce and steady.
NYC should also be doing more to promote composting. Perhaps offer free compost bins to incoming residents or better advertise the locations where we can dump our banana peels and eggshells. But I digress, because this is really a widespread people problem.
We recycle in my apartment, putting paper bags full of cleaned, recyclable goods into the tiny room that houses the trash chute. But several times I have caught building staff members taking our bags and simply dumping them down the chute where the rest of it went. Now, when I am too lazy to rinse out a yogurt cup, I don’t feel as bad just dumping it in the trash, because I know it’s all going to the same place.
Whoever is in charge here in NYC, or in many places across the US, needs to actually commit to making things cleaner. And people, like you and me, need to care more, so that when recycling and compost bins do appear more readily, we’re not nonchalantly throwing our hotdog wrappers into whichever bin is closest. A NYC with less trash means an Earth with less trash, and that sounds just great to me. Smells great, too. Well, not great, but better.