Calgary Gets A Blue Cart Recycling Program

I'm really happy that Calgary finally is getting a curbside recycling program. Yes, people from other cities, by all means, make fun of us. March 2009, and the blue cart program is starting, in one quadrant of the city (the other quadrants are to follow, so the program will be in full swing by July). Are we ever behind the times. Vancouver implemented a pilot program of curbside recycling in 1989. Ontario's first program started in 1985. I remember Calgary politicians talking about the issue back in 2006 (or so), but they decided it would be best to not bother for a few years.

Before this program was implemented, you could recycle in Calgary, we just didn't have curbside recycling. There are green recycle bins in various communities, and recyclable materials could...can be dropped off there. I say can, because unfortunately, Calgary's blue cart program only services single detached houses. Disappointing. I live in a condo, and that means no dice. The green bins remain open for business for folks like me, which has a few downsides. You have to have a car (well, not have, there are ways around that, but for the most part), you have to find space to store the materials, and you have to sort them yourself at the depot. The other major downside community drop offs is all of the lazy fuckers out there who WON'T store it, sort it, and drop it in the bins. Blue box programs make it much easier for people, so more people will actually do it.

Another MAJOR change to the program is that Calgary will now be recycling plastics 1-7. I think this is HUGE. Before, all plastics were treated as garbage. Hopefully it could still be reused, but if it was plastic, it wasn't being recycled here. I dropped off my recycling when I bought groceries on the weekend (I refuse to make a separate trip in the car for this. I have to be going somewhere anyway, otherwise it hardly seems environmentally conscious at all!), and they didn't yet have bins for plastics in the communities. I get we'll see. While I think Calgary should have done this 10 years ago (that's an understatement), I'd still like the applaud the efforts of whoever made it happen. Better late than never. That's a LOT of material that is going to be kept out of our landfills.

There did used to be a couple of private company that offered curbside recycling programs in Calgary for about $120/year. This isn't too far off what the City's program is costing, $8/month or $96 a year.

Even though I will be sleeping with milk cartons under my bed because I live in a condo, I'm still proud of Calgary for FINALLY doing the right thing.