Maspeth, NY 718-416-1656
Imagine
if New York City had its own subway system to collect garbage? Envac, a company
from Sweden, is in discussion with agencies in the New York Area including
neighborhood groups and private developers about erecting its vacuum systems
for collecting garbage in select locations around New York.
Garbage vacuums work pretty much
like those pneumatic tube systems found in “modern” buildings from the early 20th
Century. You put your garbage—or recycling and/or compostables—into the
appropriate receptacle. A few seconds later and, whooooosh, a trapdoor opens
that drops your disposables into a set of vacuum tubes. Suddenly, your trash is
flying along silently at 50 miles per hours from the powers of vacuum suction
toward the recycling center, a biofuel/composting center or an incinerator.
Envac installed one of its garbage
vacuum systems in Roosevelt Island, a thin strip of land in the shadow of
Manhattan in the 1970’s. At this time, Envac also installed one of its vacuum
systems in Disney World. Currently, plans are under consideration to extend the
network to technology campuses being erected on the island by Cornell
University and the Technion.
Also, Envac is studying the
possibility of putting networks of trash tubes under the Coney Island
boardwalk, in a new development being created by major property companies, and
near the Chelsea district in Manhattan. The vacuum operated garbage systems
would leverage some of the infrastructure of the High Line, an urban
development created from an old elevated train platform. If all works out,
pedestrians will be walking underneath trash-filled tubes. Rosina Abramson, in
charge of running Envacs’ United States operations says “We can retrofit in
dense urban areas so we don’t have to rip up the street.”
You may ask why this is
necessary or important to consider in the New York area? If you think about it,
humans now actually cater to their garbage, not the other way around. You store
your trash at home all week until Trash Day comes. Cities invest millions a
year on trucks specially designed for garbage and employ armies of men and
women to usher it along.
With vacuum networks,
trash collection gets largely automated. Most garbage trucks can be taken off
the streets, eliminating traffic and noise. Receptacles overflowing with food
cartons and newspapers disappear. You’re looking at the equivalent of three
dumpsters in the picture. Envac needs electricity to create the suction inside
of its vacuum tubes, but the diesel consumption avoided means carbon dioxide is
reduced with these networks. There will be no odors, no spills, and no vermin.
The vacuum systems also facilitate recycling because you just drop your garbage
in and there it goes.
Envac and some developers are even
studying the possibility of adding a “pay as you throw” feature to some
networks. Residents in a residential complex would only be able to open the
doors to the receptacles in their area with RFID cards. A sensor would then
weigh the garbage, recyclables and compostables and provide the data for
monthly, personalized trash bills. No more subsidizing the slothful.
For more information, visit the article "Will New York City Get A Subway For Garbage," published by Forbes, and linked HERE, or visit BoroWideRecycling.com.
