Garbage In, Garbage Out

You know what I've noticed? Chicago doesn't give a shit about recycling.

No real city-wide residential recycling program. Once upon a time, recycling at home consisted of placing recyclables into a blue bag and then putting said bag into your normal garbage bin. I don't even know that could be theoretically successful and needless to say, it was an utter failure from the beginning. A bin system has been recently introduced, but for some silly reason it's only in a handful of neighborhoods.


City recycling drop-off centers are scattered, hard to find, and poorly maintained. It's full because it never gets emptied, not because people are recycling a lot. Most people here just throw bottles, cans, and paper right into the trash without hesitation. I'm pulling this number soley from personal experience (i.e., my ass), but I'd say, conservatively, that 2/3 of a person's trash is either recyclable or even avoidable.

At least the park districts have recycling bins (so says the optimist in me). Still, it just seems that people around here are inescapably materialistic, yet only a minority care about conserving the resources for those materials.

Oh well.