Friday, July 8, 2011

Let's Make Phoenix An Even Greener City With Some Blue Bins

Good morning Greenies!  It sure has been a while since my last post and I truly apologize for that.  Between going back to school, moving across the country, writing/editing two novels and watching my Boston Bruins win the Stanley Cup life has been pretty much non-stop action and I just had to let a few things fall by the wayside.

Sadly Green Leaf Reviewer was one of those things.

But now we're moved to Phoenix, Arizona, hockey season is over and I haven't started my next class yet so it seems as good a time as any to toss out a mini update on all things Green in the Southwest!

When we arrived at our apartment complex I was a little sad to see that there weren't separate dumpsters in the complex for recycling.  Because we have so much stuff from moving (newspaper being the real biggie -- the boxes will be stored and given to my sister when she buys her house to move yea!) i was hopeful we would be able to make use of the blue bin for a good chunk of it.

Back in Boston, on average, we had at least double the ammount in our recycle bin to the regular trash bin.  Not having a recycle dumpster was going to present a new challenge for us.  Sadly we had no choice but to hate the environment for a couple days because 1) We had no internet access to locate the closest transfer station and 2) The building management couldn't give us any info on where it was.

Really?  In this day and age I would think that there would be bins everywhere and if not at least there would be information available.  but sadly I was mistaken.

I got relly tired of hating the environment by throwing away all kinds of stuff that I don't even want to talk about tossing so I finally started researching where the closest transfer/recycling drop off location is to me.  Want to know what I found?  A whole lot of nothing unfortunately.

I ended up on the City of Phoenix website, I meandered my way over the the Environment and Sustainability page, and then I found the Recycling Information link was broken.  Bummer.  Instead I found my way to the Green Phoenix site where I learned all kinds of great information on how Phoenix is striving to be the single most sustainable city in America.

Woah, that's a tall order for sure but they have some amazing initiatives they'll be addressing in order to get there including retro fitting buildings with solar, installing more efficient city lighting and a restoration of a huge stretch of the Salt River (a popular vacation destination among other things). 

Of course then it seems totally ironic to me that they're on such a Green kick and I can't even recycle my plastics in my own complex.  Nor can I find a bit of information where I can even take my recyclables to be dropped off locally.  I started on my mission to find out if I could find out more.

The first order of business was to read every link on the page.  A huge resource of information but none pertaining to what I was currently looking for.  Next I located a pdf of what was acceptable to recycle.  At the bottom of that I found an email address which I submitted my question of where to find a transfer station.

And I figured while I was at it I might as well inquire about how to petition to get my community onto a regular recycling pick up rotation.  I mean what's the harm in that right?  An extra dumpster is no problem in a parking lot this size!

I came across the un-broken link of the Pollution Prevention and Recycling page and there is a terrific summary of information on what/why/how Phoenix recycles...just no where!

Hopefully I'll hear back from someone very soon because for as many phenomenal programs that the city is/has spent money initiating of late one of the most basic is lacking in information.  I'll keep the progress up to date and who knows, maybe I'll end up becoming a community activist after all!