Ineffective blue bags scrapped; City
to push blue bin recycling
By Miriam Y. Cintron
The City of Chicago’s beleaguered and ineffective blue bag recycling program, adopted more than a decade ago, has ended. The program called for city residents to place recyclables such as plastics, cans, and paper into blue bags, but because the bags were thrown in with regular trash, City sanitation workers had a difficult job separating recyclables from other garbage.
The City is replacing
blue bags with a new blue bin recycling system that will expand
gradually to cover the entire city. Under the new program, residents
receive a 96-gallon blue bin in which they can place recyclables, either
loose or bagged; workers from the Department of Streets and Sanitation
collect the recyclables separately from regular trash every other week.Residents in more than 80,000 single-family houses and buildings with fewer than four units already are using the blue bins, according to the City. Starting this month, workers will place blue bins at an additional 92,000 housing units. Streets and Sanitation Commissioner Michael Picardi announced at a press conference last month that the City has set a goal of placing blue bins in all 600,000 housing units his department serves by the end of 2011.
The new program costs more than the blue bag initiative; to offset the added expense, the City will stop sorting waste mechanically, which will save taxpayers $10.5 million per year. Additionally, the State of Illinois provided a grant of $8 million for the program, and the City will save millions on landfill fees by keeping recyclable materials out of the regular garbage stream.
“The program has been a huge success,” said Ald. Manny Flores, whose 1st Ward, including the neighborhoods of West Town, Wicker Park, and Ukrainian Village, has numerous blue bins. “Our recycling participation rate used to be below 5%. Now, we’re at 18% to 20% participation after just one year.”
Flores explained he wants to “continue to grow that participation” by informing people just “how easy it is to recycle” with this new program. For the past three years, the City slowly expanded the blue bin system beyond a pilot program established in April 2005 on the Far Southwest Side. The pilot’s success led officials to accelerate their expansion plan to complete bin placement by 2011.
Until then, residents in areas without blue bins can take recyclables to one of 16 regional dropoff centers, including at 1150 N. North Branch, 1424 W. 39th St., and 1758 S. Clark St.
“It’s clearly a worthwhile program,” said Ald. Robert Fioretti, whose 2nd Ward has the drop-off center on Clark Street in the South Loop. When it comes to environmental issues, it is important to look at the bigger picture to make the city, and the Earth, greener, Fioretti explained.
“We have to educate ourselves on the merits of recycling, ”he added. “This is a big issue we’re facing.” The City will continue to sort blue bags from regular trash through the end of the summer, but asked Chicagoans to start taking recyclables to local recycling centers as soon as possible until they get blue bins.
