Trash Talk

The can on top is located somewhere on St. Marks, not in front of the De La Vega store, but in front of an apartment building close by. All of James De La Vega's work makes me smile- it is full of humor and is sometimes a bit controversial. I love the look of the can but not its functionality. New York's lack of recycling/composting is actually despicable. It blows my mind that this city, the most populous in the U.S., offers the public nowhere to dispose of newspapers, magazines,empty bottles and cans other than with regular garbage. The bottom 3 images are of Toronto's brand spankin' new garbage, recycling, and cigarette disposal device. Toronto has been ahead of the recycling/composting curve for a long time now, but I question the genius of this new design. Designed by Astral Media ,"Toronto's official and exclusive supplier of nearly 27,000 pieces of street furniture", the device is made of plastic (not the most eco-friendly material), is kind of fat (taking up valuable sidewalk space, a concern in city full of Bugaboos) and the nifty press to open peddle is most likely going to get jammed in the slushy/snowy winter months (which kind of suck and don't need to interfere with Torontonians' lives in any additional way).

If only someone could create a receptacle with the attitude of De La Vega's can and the functionality of Astral Media's device and then put it in all major cities in North America (Mr. Bloomberg, are you there? Its me, Miriam). I mean, who wouldn't want to put their trash in an environmentally advanced garbage receptacle covered in words of wisdom?