The fight against waste starts in our parks

Sustainable solutions needed to address garbage problem

Why don’t more of Montreal’s public parks have separate bins for garbage and recyclable materials?

It’s a question that’s puzzled me for years. After spending the cold, dark winter months indoors, or bundled up against the snow and ice, Montrealers hit the parks en masse when springtime rolls around. It’s our annual ritual of survival and humanity. Families, friends and neighbours haul coolers and backpacks full of food and drink to share with one another. We pack hammocks and blankets, tam-tams, hibachis and Frisbees. We treasure these lazy weekend afternoons outdoors eating, drinking and playing in our collective green spaces.

That’s the upside. The downside? Come Monday morning, our parks — from Jeanne-Mance to Émilie Gamelin, Parc Lafontaine, Mount Royal and far beyond — are marred by trash cans overflowing with mostly recyclable and compostable material, and lawns pocked with broken glass and cigarette butts. Yuck.

After this particularly beautiful weekend, TVA shared a story about all the detritus left behind by merry-makers at Parc Lafontaine: tables left full of half-eaten food, empty bottles of wine and booze, Solo cups and paper plates.

This indicates a deeper problem: a lack of respect and personal responsibility among citizens toward our shared collective spaces. Still, it might just help if more trash bins, as well as recycling bins were conveniently available.

In the spring, the city launched a campaign to encourage Montrealers to clean up after themselves. Using the hashtag #RamasseToi, social media users are encouraged to share photos of garbage left behind in public spaces. But I’m not sure public naming, shaming and blaming is an effective awareness strategy. It seems a bit more stick than carrot. (In fact, it sort of backfired: many citizens started tweeting pictures of ubiquitous construction cones abandoned by the city.)

So, what about the city’s Sustainable Montreal 2016-2020 plan, which was launched under former mayor Denis Coderre? It indicates that the government objectives for recyclable material is to reach 70 per cent (it was 58.3 per cent in 2014).

All good. But, curiously, nowhere in the document does it include a strategy to support more recycling in our public parks.

As I dug into the question, I learned that there seems to be more to the story than just making more recycling bins available, and it goes beyond Montreal. The province of Quebec, as it turns out, does not have the capacity to meet our recycling demand.

There are some red flags being raised around Quebec’s recycling industry. A 2014 CBC report indicated that facilities were shutting down because the market for selling recycled materials was falling, while operating costs were on the rise.

Many operators didn’t have the money to upgrade their technologies to process the new plastics on the market, or to separate out the garbage thrown in with recyclable material in the bins. As a result, much of Quebec’s recyclable material was being sent overseas for processing.

Now, however, Quebec faces a “recycling crisis” in the wake of China’s decision to ban the import of various forms of waste material.

It’s clearly more complicated than I thought. Still, there are things we can do.

First, when you head out to the parks for picnics, bring reusable cups, cutlery and plates. Avoid the disposable stuff (I’m guilty of this, too).

Second, bring extra garbage and recycling bags. Take responsibility for your mess.

The city administration has a role to play as well. In Toronto, parks and commercial streets all have separate bins for trash, recyclables and compostable materials.

Here in Montreal, STM métro stations are equipped with separate bins for trash and recyclable materials. Could we adapt or import these existing models for waste management into our parks?

Montrealers treasure our green spaces, but every year the garbage problem seems to get worse. It’s time to come up with a sustainable solution.