Garbage cities + SF meetup this eve

Hello from San Francisco! Oversharing was off last week and this Tuesday while I bounced around the East Coast. I’m now in SF for a few days, enjoying the sun and blue skies, and all the tacos the city has to offer. Regularly scheduled Oversharing programming will resume next week.

Thanks to everyone who rsvp’d to the SF Oversharing drinks meetup this eve. If you didn’t respond but are free later today and interested in joining, get in touch and I’ll send you the details.

In the meantime, a quick garbage dispatch from my brief stopover in New York City. New York’s garbage problem, as we’ve talked about, is severe. Here are some photos I took while walking around the city one day:

The sanitation department recently pledged to ramp up neighborhood trash pickup and sidewalk cleaning on the Upper East Side, where both bins and rats overflow, but that feels like a bandaid on a gaping wound without a larger overhaul of how the city stores, collects, and disposes of garbage. Meanwhile, residents of Perinton, a town in upstate New York that borders a landfill the city sends garbage to, are suing over violations of their right to a clean and healthful environment. The complaint claims that the High Acres Landfill and Recycling Center, which receives garbage from Brooklyn and the Bronx, has harmed and disrupted lives with its “persistent, noxious, offensive Odors and Fugitive Emissions.” More than 200 residents included in the lawsuit have complained of nausea, headaches, and stress, symptoms I also experience after spending too much time on a New York City sidewalk ahead of trash day, much less in close proximity to a major dumping ground.

Over in SF, the city recently released the preliminary results of its pilot of some very posh new trash cans. The results were decidedly uninspiring. Bin designs “Salt & Pepper” and “Slim Silhouette” got the best results, with about 30% favorable responses, but all six prototypes received more negative than positive feedback. Salt & Pepper fans liked the bin’s shape and overall look, but thought the opening for trash was too small. Slim Silhouette also got good marks on shape and overall look, but was docked for a small opening. The most expensive prototype, “Soft Square,” came in second to last in the rankings. Despite its $20,900 pricetag, Soft Square had trouble handling regular garbage, which tended to get stuck or overflow, and several Soft Squares were spotted with busted doors or broken hinges after just a month of use.

That’s all for now! I’m off for a trash bin treasure hunt before the public feedback period closes tomorrow. Hoping to find a Soft Square—it’s not every day you get to see a $21,000 trash can IRL. See you Tuesday,

Ali

MORE GARBAGE:

• The case for containerized trash (Curbed)

• Rats to the rescue: could pesky rodents finally get New Yorkers composting? (The Guardian)