8 Thursday, September 15, 2011
www.northshoreoutlook.com
Not all materials are recycled equally M y wife is an inveterate recycler. From the tiny the blue box. Here, Pacific Mobile Depots, which operplastic weapons that come packed with our son’s ates in Metro Vancouver and Victoria, collects things like Marvel superhero action figures to Styrofoam the hard plastic containers with recycling codes #3, #6, containers, chip bags and frames from old sunglasses. #7 that usually come with cake, veggie platters or sushi I admire her devotion to the planet. Really, I do. But inside. You can also bring milk and juice cartons, tetra there’s one problem: most of the items that accumulate in packs, soft plastics like grocery bags and foil-lined snack a confused jumble in a corner of our kitchpackages — to name just a few. en can’t just be tossed into the blue box I’m always amazed by the numand taken to the curb on garbage day. ber of people — young and old And while my wife recycles devoutly, her — who show up with green intenenthusiasm usually ends in the kitchen. tions. There’s a minimal fee for Justin Beddall That leaves me to sort and bag the heap of the service, but when you see the editor@northshore used plastic and containers that accumumountains of materials piling up outlook.com lates each week. there between 9 a.m. and noon Fortunately, here on the North Shore and realize it’s all being diverted there’s somewhere to take the “recyclables” from the landfill it doesn’t seem the municipalities won’t collect. to matter. On the third Saturday of the month, at the Presentation Now, imagine the great wall of waste that could be House parking lot at Chesterfield and West 3rd, a dedicat- redirected from the dump if all North Shore residents ed group of enviro-conscious North Shore residents arrive could simply chuck all of those aforementioned items with bags and boxes full of items that are banned from in the blue box. In this province, the green movement has gained significant traction over the past decade. And in North and West Vancouver, where the municipal governments have become leaders in sustainability, residents have largely embraced green living. ~ Accepting fall registration ~ So why isn’t the curbside recycling Ages 3 to Adult • Ballet • Jazz program, which includes newspaper, • Lyrical • Hip Hop • Tap • Irish cardboard and mixed paper, glass, aluminum and some plastics expanded • Musical Theatre • Acro VOTED BEST DANCE STUDIO 2010 to include other daily waste items to • Modern ON THE NORTH SHORE make it easier for people to do the right thing for the environment? Well, as I learned, it’s a simple, twopart answer. Firstly, it would be prohibitively expensive for the curbside pickup for bulky items like Styrofoam — just think of how much packaging came with your high-def TV. And secondly, there are not viable secondary remanufactur808 Lytton Street, North Vancouver ing markets for many items — like, for www.seymourdance.com • 604.929.6060 instance, plastic film (garbage bags) — currently banned from the blue boxes. “Some things are just not sustainable to collect,” Allen Lynch, manager of North Shore Recycling, told me. “Economically and environmentally — they are just not.” And unlike companies like Pacific Mobile Depots, the North Shore municipalities can’t simply charge
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Province could seize, auction off cars of suspected street racers
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West Vancouver police and the civil forfeiture office looking at confiscating Porsche, BMW of 17-year-old drivers for 15 days and police are recommending charges against both for excessive speeding and failing to stop for police. est Vancouver police are looking at WVPD spokesman Cpl. Jag Johal said Tuesday handing over two luxury cars impoundthat he hopes the threat of confiscated for allegedly street racing vehicles will curb recent incidents ing on Cypress Mountain to the proof youth street racing in the Lower vincial government for seizure. Mainland. If the action proceeds, the vehicles “Anybody that speeds — not even just will become the property of the B.C. young people — it’ll definitely send the Civil Forfeiture Office and could be message that if your car is going to get auctioned off to the public for cash. seized or your parents’ car is going to The two vehicles in question — a get seized that you’ll definitely think new-model Porsche and a BMW — twice about putting the pedal to the were allegedly clocked by a WVPD metal.” officer doing 143 km/h in a 60-km Cpl. Jag Johal Johal said the department has been in zone up Cypress Bowl Road on Sept. touch with Victoria about the civil for2. feiture process for the vehicles and the Behind the wheels were two 17-year-old novice decision to proceed with the seizure ultimately drivers who attempted to evade police, causing lies with the provincial government. the driver of the BMW to lose control of the car, tcoyne@northshoreoutlook.com sending it into a ditch where it sustained $15,000 twitter.com/toddcoyne worth of damage, police said. Both teenagers were prohibited from driving TODD COYNE
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extra to collect such items. “(It would be an) astronomical increase in cost (to taxpayers),” said Lynch, who noted households currently pay about $75 a year for the curbside recycling program. But the recycling front will likely change drastically in three years with the introduction of expanded producer responsibility legislation that will extend to “all packaging and printed papers” and make “product stewards” foot 100 per cent of the recycling cost. That means you’re likely to see product producers using more environmentally sound packaging and materials that have remanufacturing value — the kind of stuff that will likely be allowed in your blue box. Until then, you’ll find me at the Presentation House parking lot on the third Saturday of the month. editor@northshoreoutlook.com twitter.com/justinbeddall
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