New York Times
New York City, where sidewalks have long been overrun by
foul-smelling heaps of garbage bags that force passers-by to yield to
oncoming rat traffic, is about to try a not-so-novel idea to solve the
problem.
The concept, known as trash containerization, seems
simple enough: Get trash off the streets and into containers. The
strategy has been used successfully in cities across Europe and Asia,
like Barcelona and Singapore.
But in New York, nothing is that simple.
In a highly anticipated new report
being released on Wednesday, city sanitation officials estimate that it
would be possible to move trash to containers on 89 percent of the
city’s residential streets. To do so, however, will require removing
150,000 parking spots, and up to 25 percent of parking spots on some
blocks.
The report does not address the cost of implementing trash
containerization citywide, but it could easily cost hundreds of
millions of dollars over the next decade. City officials must buy new
specialized trash trucks and stationary containers, while also
increasing the frequency of trash collection in large swaths of the
city.
The new approach could revolutionize trash
collection in New York. Mayor Eric Adams, a Democrat in his second year
in office, has said attacking trash is one of his priorities, framing it
as part of broader efforts to improve quality of life in the city after
the disruption of the pandemic. He has hired a new rat czar with a “killer instinct” for slaying rats.
But
embracing trash containers will require trade-offs, including
sacrificing more parking spots than were taken for outdoor dining or the
city’s popular bike-share program — both of which stirred pockets of
outrage.
The city’s sanitation commissioner, Jessica Tisch, said
in a statement that sanitation officials were working hard to remove
trash more quickly, including setting new hours for placing trash on the curb, and that trash containerization was the critical next step.
“Mayor
Adams wants a permanent solution, something like what other global
cities have that takes our sidewalks back from the black bags — and from
the rats,” she said. “The detailed street-level analysis in this report
shows, for the first time, that containerization — in the form of
individual bins and shared containers — actually is viable across the
vast majority of the five boroughs.”
The
new trash program would look different across the city depending on the
block. For a single-family home in eastern Queens, residents could be
required to use individual bins for trash, recycling and compost. On a
block lined with six-story apartment buildings in northern Manhattan,
the street could get a dozen large aboveground containers — artist
renderings suggest a cross between a dumpster and a giant laundry bin —
placed in parking spaces.
By this fall, the city will start a major new pilot program in West Harlem, in Community Board 9,
that will install large trash containers in parking spots on up to 10
residential blocks and at more than a dozen schools. On residential
blocks, trash collection will double from three times a week to six.
At
a time when Mr. Adams is cutting spending across city agencies, he
included more than $5.6 million for the pilot program in his latest
executive budget proposal — a sign of his commitment to the idea, city
officials said.
Shaun Abreu, a City Council member who represents
West Harlem, said in a statement that he was excited for the
neighborhood to be a part of the pilot program and that it would “make a
real difference and teach the city a lot about the path forward.”
The
city’s 95-page new report examined trash containerization in cities
across the world that have been experimenting with the idea for 15 years
and analyzed the program’s feasibility in each neighborhood. In the
United States, San Francisco and Chicago remove garbage bags from the
streets, mostly using individual bins and Chicago’s famed alleyways
which New York City does not have.
New
York City is a bit of a global pariah when it comes to trash. On
garbage days in Manhattan, towers of fetid trash bags line the streets,
with food and liquids oozing on to sidewalks. Sanitation workers carry
out the Sisyphean task of carting away 24 million pounds of trash and
recycling every day.
Other cities have successfully reined in their garbage. Amsterdam uses underground storage and electric boats. Singapore and other cities use a pneumatic pressure chute system.
Barcelona, Buenos Aires and Paris rely on shared and individual trash
containers, providing the most useful examples of what is possible in
New York, city officials said.
The report was written by
Sanitation Department staffers and informed by a study by McKinsey &
Company, the consulting firm, that was initially reported to cost $4
million. The city ultimately paid McKinsey & Company $1.6 million
for the study, city officials said.
Ms. Tisch said in an interview
that it was too early to provide an estimate for the total cost. But
she acknowledged that the cost was “not inexpensive.”
“It
is one of the most massive, complicated infrastructure programs this
city can undertake over the next decade because it affects every
borough, every neighborhood, every block and frankly every resident in
the City of New York,” she said.
Parking is one of the third rails
of New York City politics, and the plan could face pushback in some
communities. The city has roughly 3 million free street parking spots.
Trash containerization would remove up to 10 percent of available
parking spots on residential streets citywide, compared to less than 1 percent of parking spots removed for outdoor dining.
Citi Bike, the city’s bike-share program, has taken about half of a
percent of curb space in its service area for bike docks, according to
the company.
On 11 percent of the city’s most densely populated
residential streets in places like Lower Manhattan, the city found that
it was not feasible to install containers because there was not enough
street space for the trash produced in those areas.
