Toronto may have the world's most complicated garbage regime. But why do we bother sorting? The city doesn't..
by James Charles
March 3, 2005
I cannot believe that I actually remembered that today was Friday, which meant I hauled my trash and garbage to the curb on time.
Since my work doesn't tie me to a calendar, sometimes I lose track of days. It's often a mad race to get the stuff out when I hear the truck rumbling along the street because I don't wake up shouting "TGIF!" It's not that I generate much refuse--I could get by on every-other-week collections, and often do because I don't realize it is pick-up day until the truck is disappearing around the corner. But the city wants to collect it so I should get it outside; besides, I spend so much time sorting, I'm proud to have it carted off to Cherry St.
Last summer, Toronto inaugurated what may be the world's most complicated garbage regime. Yet, in the process, an environmentally friendly policy that started with good intentions turned into a total bollix by the time it reached the streets of the Great Hairy Metropolis.
Unlike careless condo and apartment dwellers, who were chided this week by City Council for not being diligent recyclers, I made a dutiful effort to master the new system. I memorized the worksheet distributed by the city which outlined--in English, French and, for people who understand neither, graphics — what to do. Printed on durable, heavy paper and just the right size for a weekly reference guide, the city explained how to keep Toronto green. I kept it handy while sorting garbage, trash, bottles, cans and paper the way Canada Post sorts mail: I developed a decent underhand toss, hitting the proper bin or open bag with impressive regularity--unlike my mail which often has to be re-delivered by the obliging neighbour who received it by mistake.
according to the city, food garbage goes in little bags and held in a small green bin which gets transferred to a large clear bag and deposited in a slightly larger green bin. Trash that is not food or recyclable goes into another bag, preferably green, but doesn't get binned at all. The whole thing is mired in total confusion. aluminium foil, for example: You'd easily conclude it was non-food trash. But what about foil with food wrapped in it? Does it go into the big, clear bag or the big, not-clear bag? Do you separate food from foil? In my house, at least, opening the foil and removing the food for sorting can be as great a health risk as asbestos: Those toxic packages in the fridge can be weeks or even months old, and I'm terrified of handling them without wearing biohazard gloves. What about the Styrofoam trays that package meat at grocery chains? are they recycled--they're plastic, like juice bottles--or go in the green bag? Or the clear bag if there still is food on them? Deciding what to do with cat litter goes remains a total mystery. Thank goodness there isn't an infant in my house: I'd have no idea where to put disposable diapers, and shudder to think what the house would smell like if diapers only got collected every other week with other non-food trash.
Then, to mix things up a little, the city tossed a wrench in the works. after years of harrumphing us into carefully sorting paper from bottles and cans, Toronto decided everything could mix together in a single bin--just not the one for food or trash, which doesn't have a bin anyway. One week, such co-mingling was prohibited; the next, we were allowed to jumble everything together. What changed in seven days to the chemistry of paper, plastic and aluminium?
I am sure there is an answer but doubt it will make sense since it would be written by a functionary buried deep in city hall and understandable only to other bureaucrats. Undoubtedly, dozens of committee meetings were held before it was recommended to another set of committees that plastic and paper be allowed to co-habitate in Recycle World. These were probably the same committees that decreed leaves and yard clippings must go in paper sacks for composting, another initiative with good intentions. But did anyone on those committees ever generate yard waste, or take Grade 3 science? Don't they know what happens to paper when gets wet in the rain? It loses strength! Unless we're in a drought, the leaves and clippings collected during the previous two weeks plummet like a stone through the soaked bottom when the pick-up truck is three houses away and I am racing the bag to the curb.
Nevertheless, we try to comply. after all, it's for our grandchildren‘s grandchildren.
Yet here is what occurs when everything is at the curb, properly fluffed and folded, and largely unseen by my neighbours who have done their own sorting but have more productive things to do than watching Friday garbage collections. Big blue creeps down the street, a pair of workers trailing behind to toss all our gift-wrapped, properly binned, refuse into the back of--a single truck. That's right. Garbage, trash, recycling, it all goes in the same truck. Wait a minute! I spent a small but noticeable part of each day making sure that everything went in the proper bin, and these guys are smooshing it together in the motorized monster. It happens every Friday.
"Why do we bother?" I wrote to my councillor in frustration. She didn't reply; probably too busy sorting her garbage.
When not sorting his garbage, Jim Charles is a Toronto writer whose next book is LifeIn The Dominion: an american's Mostly affectionate Look at Living InCanada
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