Municipality Launches Waste-Kangaroo System to Modernize Recycling in City Center
Perhaps many have not yet realized it, but what started yesterday in the historic center is an authentic revolution. Or more precisely, it will prove to be such if the residents respond positively to the Municipality‘s input.
The technical language is appropriate, considering we are talking about the computerized waste-eating «kangaroo» in operation since yesterday morning in two points of the city: in piazza Garibaldi and in piazza Catena. Both stations are supervised (and will be for a couple of weeks) by municipal staff (conscientious objectors or construction workers) who assist users in the process of disposing of sorted household waste: the «kangaroo» «digests» separately paper, glass, plastic, and general waste.
The experimentation and the operation
On the first day of the trial, most people who used the new system appreciated it. Perhaps because in the future, thanks to it, everyone will pay waste taxes based on the actual weight of the trash they produce and dispose of, rather than on the square meters of their residence.
While waiting for each resident of the center to receive their personal magnetic card by mail (distribution will begin next week), the «kangaroos» are operated by those anonymous personnel from the Municipality. After inserting the card, the user selects the type of waste to dispose of by pressing one of the buttons on the column.
At that point, whether the user is at piazza Garibaldi—where the container is buried—or next to the column itself at piazza Catena (where the bin is outside), the «digestive tube» of the kangaroo activates, which gathers the material dropped in the «mouth», crushes it, compacts it, and transfers it into the «stomach».
Each large container consists of eight smaller containers of 800 liters each, equivalent to 4-5 of the traditional dumpsters. Those ugly, bulky, and stinky bins destined to disappear (hopefully if people respond well) from street corners or squares, exactly thanks to the adoption of the kangaroos.
Costs and reactions
For which the Riva Municipality, it must be said, has made a considerable investment: each kangaroo costs about 75 million lire, to which another 15 million are added for the underground works. These are not wasted funds if the new course is adopted by everyone, including the lady (and all who think like her) who complained yesterday: «I don’t have time,» she said, «to separate waste».
In reality, it’s not a matter of time, because it takes only a few minutes to put bottles in one bag, newspapers in another, and plastic bottles in yet another, but rather laziness and poor education.
