Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Trash Generation/Dumpsters in Cohousing

[S Brian Burke (sbrianburke]

Love and Greetings to all Cohos,
SEND US YOUR GARBAGE....READ ON BELOW!
(First time posting, so I hope that I'm keeping Fred happy.) This is a 
subject that warms my heart: Quayside Village's on-going quest to eliminate 
our dumpster! We are 39 people, 20 units and almost as many cats it seems, 5 
blocks from the Pacific in the city of North Vancouver, up in Canada. We 
have a 2 yard, suitably patriotic, red dumpster, the smallest available,and 
when we moved in 5 years ago, we adopted a goal of 90% recycling. This 
means, as recycling and composting co-ordinator, I long for the day when we 
can cancel our private pick-up contract and then somehow beg the city to 
allow us to use 6 little garbage cans or so, as part of the single family 
home pick-up program.

So I'm very impressed, Diane, if there are any Cohousing communities, who 
have reduced their garbage to the point, where they don't need dumpsters any 
more. We're quite proud of our progress to date. According to a little 
survey I've been doing, we're recycling 63% of everything that leaves our 
property, so about 37% ends up in the dumpster. Our system has been featured 
in a Home and Garden Channel piece on our community. If it can be recycled, 
we try and do it, whatever it takes.

Which brings me to my question. Can anyone send us your garbage? I mean your 
stats on garbage generation. How are we doing compared to other Cohos? I've 
also done a survey in our neighbourhood and discovered that almost all 
similar condos have their bins picked up weekly, whereas our's has always 
been serviced every 2 weeks.

Can any of you get out your calculators and tape measures? Here's my 
suggestion. I've found out our bin is 2 cubic yards and that it is 75%- 100% 
full every time, so every month we generate 4 cubic yards. For 39 people, 
I've included all kids and the 3 guests, who are looking like permanent 
members these days.

So that means, at Quayside, we produce 0.10 cubic yards,per person,per month 
or multiply that by 27, and we get 2.7 cu feet per person or about 3 plastic 
supermarket bags a month, averaged out, if I've done my math right.  How are 
we doing, guys?

Salutes to the network, keep up all the good,
Cheeers,  Brian Burke



> From: Diane Simpson <coho [at] theworld.com>
> Reply-To: cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org
> To: Cohousing List <cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org>
> Subject: [C-L]_Trash Generation/Dumpsters in Cohousing
> Date: Wed, 21 Aug 2002 05:31:26 -0500
>
> Hi fellow trash-geeks!
>
> In all of my travels across the country to visit cohousing communities I
> always take slides of the trash collection area. I have never seen a
> dumpster.
>
> Are there any of you out in coho-land that use a dumpster? Do you feel it
> was necessary to go that route? How big is your community?
>
> I would be very interested in hearing your experiences regarding trash
> generation in your community, and what are the number of units.
>
> --Diane Simpson
>     Jamaica Plain Cohousing, Boston
>
>
>                "The people around you define the quality of your life."
>                    Ask me about Cohousing!   http://jpcohousing.org
>  NEXT INFO SESSION: SUNDAY AUGUST 25  BOWDITCH LODGING HOUSE,   5 P.M.
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