No Trashcan For You!

 

 



How do you break a garbage can?
For whatever reason,
 this subway can was taken out of service.

Yesterday I was asked why I think litter/general filth is such a big problem in this area. The short answer is: there's a whole lotta people and not enough public trash receptacles. Anyone exiting the Roosevelt Avenue station can see that this is a very densely populated area. Besides the people who actually live here, this area also has many folks passing through at all hours of the day and night. The Roosevelt Avenue train station is a major transfer hub for people traveling to and from JFK and LaGuardia. In addition, there is a huge city hospital just a few blocks away. And of course there are some well known bars and restaurants along Roosevelt and Woodside that attract people from other neighborhoods and boroughs (don't get me started on the omnipresent line of hipsters outside Ayada; if you find an empty pack of yellow American Spirits, it was probably dropped by one of them...just kidding...well, not really). So yeah, there are a lot of people here. And people produce trash. And we need a place to dispose of this trash.

 

Why then are there hardly any public trash cans??

 

I believe there are a couple cans along Roosevelt Avenue right near the train exits. But we need a can on every corner of Roosevelt, Broadway, and Woodside Avenues.

 

Someone told me that the city took away many of the public trash cans because people kept using them for household trash disposal. I guess the oh-so-brilliant people who control can distribution figured that if they took away public garbage receptacles, people would realize the error of their ways, stop taking advantage of the public garbage cans, and, uh, wave a magic wand to make their excess trash disappear-? I know it's a burden on the city to have to clean up after people who dump their household trash in public cans, but taking away the cans doesn't stop this practice. Obviously folks still dispose of their garbage improperly, only instead of in cans, they leave it right on the sidewalks and streets and on seemingly deserted stretches of land like 43rd Avenue.

Taking away public garbage cans does nothing to deter inappropriate disposal of household trash; all it does is punish the people who live/work/pass through the neighborhood by forcing us to endure filthy conditions.

 

Please, New York City, please please please with sugar (or that white powder in the drug baggie that I found on 43rd Ave this morning) on top: Please bring back public trash cans!!! We in Elmhurst and Woodside pay taxes too, just like those fancy people in Manhattan and Brooklyn who have a plethora of public garbage cans. We don't deserve to live in squalor. Please stop punishing an entire neighborhood because of the errors (ie, improper trash disposal) of a few.

 

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Last week I wrote about the stupidity of having 2 recycling bins but no (or one small and overflowing) garbage can in front of the Queens Center Mall. This past weekend, I saw that someone had taken it upon him- or herself to provide the public with a trash container. T'was in the form of a broken plastic crate, but people recognized it as an adequate trash receptacle and proceeded to throw their trash in (or in the general vicinity of) it. So thank you, oh kind neighbor/illegal-dumper! (Hey, at the risk of sounding selfish, I'm just relieved that this plastic crate didn't end up on 43rd so I don't have to deal with it myself.)

 

 

UPDATE: Friday morn (11/14/14). This morning I saw a couple of Doe Fund workers picking up litter near Roosevelt and 74th Street!! Woohoo!! Thanks Danny D (or whoever arranged for this service). And thank you to the men and women of the Doe Fund who got stuck in this neighborhood. I know that Roosevelt and 74th offers a gross amount and variety of street debris. On behalf of my neighbors and myself, thank you- your work is very very very much appreciated!


UPDATE #2 (11/19/14). I passed this pan-in-a-can in Manhattan, and I immediately thought of this blog post. To the person who decides whether residents are worthy of having trash cans in their busy commercial areas: So there are hardly any trash cans on uber-busy Roosevelt and Woodside Avenues because we use them to dispose of our household trash? Well, at the risk of sounding as puerile as you think I am, I ask, **"How come Manhattanites get to throw out household trash in city cans and still get a can on nearly every corner?! It's not fair!!" [**read this to yourself in the most high-pitched whiney voice possible, with stamping-foot accompaniment]



Upper East Side of Manhattan