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Educational-List8475 t1_j8ko284 wrote

They’re definitely cutting them or breaking them off in some other way. My lid also became magically separated after putting it out twice. The collection crews also love throwing the bins as hard as possible at the ground, because I came home a few weeks ago and a huge chunk was broken off the container, which is the same shit they did with the other style bins. The whole new recycling bin program was a complete waste of time and money. A better investment would probably have been making sure collection crews aren’t spilling the contents all over the road (which I’ve seen them do). Anyway I’m back to using the original style

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masshole4life OP t1_j8kqv1m wrote

i understand that recycling bags seem like an oxymoron, but it's the only solution that is feasible in our unique circumstance. all the 3 deckers with jammed street parking combined with way windier weather than most of the country makes this a challenge that no one wants to acknowledge properly.

people keep pitching ideas that cannot work here. giant wheelie bins that get emptied by a mechanical arm require access to the sidewalks, which are almost totally obstructed by parked cars from end to end on both sides. i suppose it could work in single family neighborhoods but what % of the city would that even cover?

a short cruise through a neighborhood on trash day will reveal the jokes that are Bins With Lids™ that people on this very sub were promoting as a solution like we don't regularly get 30+mph wind gusts. i was downvoted and insulted for predicting exactly what we got. trash is still absolutely everywhere on collection day and we paid extra for the privilege.

recycle bags may be stupid and anti-green or whatever, but it's the only solution that will actually work.

make the bags have perforated tops so workers can easily empty them, and make them out of something we can easily recycle locally. otherwise, declare the recycling program a failure due to implementation restrictions and stop bothering us with those stupid fucking yellow bags.

the sooner everyone gets their head out of their ass, the better. it's not fucking working.

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legalpretzel t1_j8l6yud wrote

We had FAR more issues in Boston with congestion and wonky street parking and 3 deckers. And, get this, there are hills in Boston too! It seems crazy but each 2 or 3 family in boston gets one rolling bin to share and the 2 or 3 apartments all put their recycling in it. Overflow could be placed next to the bin in brown paper bags or cardboard boxes. Larger landlords (4+ units) are required to provide dumpsters and the city routinely takes landlords to housing court to deal with trash tickets. They expect the landlord to provide adequate space for trash bins and to hold their tenants accountable.

It wasn’t an issue in any neighborhood (outside of beacon hill/north end where larger landlords provided dumpsters and the rest used clear bags because there was legitimately nowhere to store bins).

I wish Worcester would move past the whole “we’re so special our tenants couldn’t possibly figure out how to roll a damn bin to the curb”.

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masshole4life OP t1_j8ld90y wrote

so boston has a law requiring dumpsters for 4 or more apartments? and you think that's the same?

those "larger" quad deckers make up roughly half of the wooden multifamilies in the city, yes, half of our "triple" deckers have 4 apartments and there ain't no dumpster requirement here.

i wish smarmy Big City Folk™ would compare apples to apples when explaining to us yokels how much better it gets done elsewhere. i hear they have subways in boston, too. surely the same car culture/requirements exist in both places, also?

have you ever seen a booted car in worcester? a red zone sidewalk? a car ticketed for parking violations on dense residential side streets?

newsflash: worcester doesn't enforce anything. worcester doesn't require quad decker owners to have dumpsters. there are dozens of ways in which worcester is nothing like boston and dozens of reasons why. good reasons? what's the difference?

worcester is not boston. worcester does not function properly at many levels. lots of things will not work here because they require a pre-existing functional framework to bolt new ideas onto.

stop pretending you don't understand this. it's a bit obnoxious.

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AceOfTheSwords t1_j8mz5m3 wrote

To poke a hole in the "Worcester is not Boston" argument, note that Lowell also uses the wheeled bins and is a much more comparable city to Worcester in most regards. I never lived there personally, only had friends who did, so I don't know the details of their implementation. But they weren't constantly complaining about their garbage collection, and it's probably where we should look for an example rather than Boston.

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mellymellcaramel t1_j8le0lk wrote

Worcester is the second biggest city in New England. If other cities surrounding Boston: Somerville, Cambridge etc can have bins, so can we. Those cities are densely populated and lots of small roads, like worcester, that also have street parking. If other Dr fly populated cities can make it happen then it’s not out of reach here.

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masshole4life OP t1_j8lfd6w wrote

they also tend to have other laws that are enforced that pave the way for things like wheelie bins to work.

one of the biggest examples is parking enforcement. worcester does not ticket for parking on the sidewalk, obstructing the sidewalk, obstructing anything, really, in it's residential neighborhoods.

I'm not talking about downtown or in spread out places. drive around any triple decker neighborhood. you'll see cars parked on the sidewalk all the way down the road. you'll see ass ends of cars sticking out of driveways blocking sidewalks.

how exactly do you think places like Cambridge and boston are able to have their trucks have access to the bins? it's because they ticket the hell out of people for parking the way we park on worcester 24/7 with no repercussions.

a lot of things would have to be enforced and regulated to make it work, and not to spoil the end for you, but worcester isn't going to do it.

worcester isn't going to do anything but rush out ideas that "work elsewhere" without laying any of the groundwork that "elsewhere" did.

I'll be back in these comments with my "told you sos" just like with these stupid ass lidded bins. it's just a matter of when.

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mellymellcaramel t1_j8mt42k wrote

You say this like I wasn’t aware and haven’t lived in the city my whole life. Wether or not worcester will do it, is not the topic. I’m saying that all of the above, ticketing cars etc etc is what should be done along with rolling bins. There is no other way. And I’m saying it’s an attainable goal.

Will they do it? Probably not for another 10 years. Not sure why you have this “told you so” attitude. Most people here are talking about solutions, and nothing will be done unless we get loud about it.

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masshole4life OP t1_j8nc8gp wrote

attainable goal? that's the "head up the ass" that I'm referring to.

if you believe that worcester is going to suddenly and whimsically just "start functioning" then you have offered no suggestion at all.

you think worcester residents are going to bang down doors at city hall to demand...more traffic tickets. you live in a fantasy.

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mellymellcaramel t1_j8nkiyc wrote

Worcester is different today than it was 10-20-30 years ago. And things will change in another 10-20-30 years also. I didn’t say it’s SUDDENLY going to start changing, I’ve seen the city take forever.

You’re the one with your head up your ass if you think everywhere stays the same for all time.

Also, the biggest plague on worcester is residents like you, people who shit on the city every chance they get they don’t do anything to change it, or even want to see it change. The worst thing about worcester are the morbid and gloomy attitudes from the residents.

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SmartSherbet t1_j8no4au wrote

And the gloominess is often combined with entitlement."Wah wah wah I get to park on the sidewalk because I want to and have always done it and it would be toooooo annoooooying to have to find a parking spot that's actually legal."

No. The sidewalk is ours to walk on, not yours to park on. That's how it works and the fact that Worcester has let you do stupid crap like this for years doesn't mean they were right or that we will let the city let you do it forever.

We are coming for our sidewalks. We are coming for safe streets, and yes, we are coming to make the city give you traffic tickets when you put our lives in danger with your reckless driving and entitled parking.

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masshole4life OP t1_j8ohux9 wrote

it's so cool how you know all about me because i point out that hopes and dreams don't create change. it's not like i have a 10 year posting history in this sub detailing my many battles with city hall and the city council or anything...

let's make a deal. I'll continue to point out stupid unworkable ideas and you can continue to propose fantasies that are tailored for other cities. will that work for you?

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HappyExperience9788 t1_j8mwi9r wrote

Im from Boston i think the yellow bags are stupid to black trash bags does the same job but im use to it by now its just another way for Worcester to make money off of us.

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Educational-List8475 t1_j8kvcdm wrote

Those are some good points. Tbh I had no idea about the new bins until I got one delivered to the house. Thought it was a little silly but hey that’s why the city wants so I went with the flow. At least until collections started breaking the bins.

Bags are actually a good idea, I had never though of it. I guess we’ll see what doesn’t happen

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gotdabsweats t1_j8l2wo0 wrote

100% they’re intentionally cutting the zip ties. I lost my bin this past week and found it down the street with no lid and a huge crack down the side. I think the lid slows them down or something which clearly irritates them.

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1kidney_left t1_j8lbnw8 wrote

While I’m not necessarily disagreeing here, I will say, plastic zip ties become VERY brittle in cold weather and crack much easier than in warm weather. Above freezing temperatures and the plastics is malleable. Drop below freezing, you bend it just a bit more than it wants to and it’s going to crack right off.

This comes from years of having a green mesh privacy screen zip tied to the chain link fence around our yard. Every winter, about 50-60% of the zip ties crack just from the cold and the wind. So we have to keep a big bag on hand to replace them through the winter months. But we never have a problem with them snapping in warm weather.

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Whole-Wishbone-7539 t1_j9cjsr2 wrote

The city's trash people are generally world class dicks. They used to skip my road on holiday weeks so they could finish on time.

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