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Toronto’s Chinese bottle ladies

theglobeandmail.com

41–46 of 46 posts

Re: Toronto’s Chinese bottle ladies

#41
Bylaw are nitpicking. i have personally helped fill my truck with cans Many many times!. you could pile them as high as you like tie it down and go to collect at a recycling facility that pays the most in my local area of the GTA and you will be only getting $60-80. I would say it would take one guy a month to collect. They should stop hiring more Bylaw to pick on people. You fire one bylaw officer you would save there 40-50k a year that would more then make up for the difference it makes. Bylaw in my opinion have a job and I think too many people complain rather then go outside and actually (shocker) talk to there neighbor and say hey this bothers me. It creates a war of someone called bylaw on you and it spreads so you call bylaw on all your neighbors it creates bad blood they hire more bylaw eventually there are so many of these lawn police that when everyone is compliant they need to justify there job.

Take my cans and metal and old electronics . My city charges me far to much to pickup trash. Go look at what you receive for your ever rising taxs it will possibly alarm you when you put a cost to it all.

I want less government I want government to fear me not the othere way around.

Re: Toronto’s Chinese bottle ladies

#42
Interesting thought- if the province finally raises bottle deposits to match inflation, very few people would leave bottles to be collected.

The fact that bottle ladies exist in Ontario demonstrates that the deposit value is too low to achieve its intended goal- everyone cleaning up their own empties.

Re: Toronto’s Chinese bottle ladies

#43
post #42

Interesting thought- if the province finally raises bottle deposits to match inflation, very few people would leave bottles to be collected. The fact that bottle ladies exist in Ontario demonstrates that the deposit value is too low to achieve its intended goal- everyone cleaning up their own empties.

The intended goal is that the empty bottles be returned, and that goal is being achieved. It doesn't matter whether it gets done by the people who used the bottles or by someone else.

Re: Toronto’s Chinese bottle ladies

#44
post #13
post #2

I'm sure this is a common phenomena anywhere with bottle deposits, but everywhere I've lived in the GTA has had at least one of these people. They can be polarizing. Some hate them, some are indifferent, others appreciate them. To the city they're a nuisance, because they take recycling money out of the pocket of the municipality. To some residents they're considered a threat or an annoyance, afraid of theft or annoy…

The nuisance factor for me when I lived in Boston (25 years ago; hopefully recycling has improved since then) was that homeless people would tear open the rubbish bags looking for containers that could be turned in for cash. If even a few people were lazy and threw deposit containers in the trash, the rest of us paid the price.

There is an easy fix for that problem. http://www.mx.dk/diashow/10018/10018-nxKHn_DMNPJM9YkDieCiyQ....

Re: Toronto’s Chinese bottle ladies

#45
post #32
post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's one in Oakland around Lake Merritt. She's been around as long as I have (15+ years). I've always wondered where she goes at night.

I’m sure there is more than just one. :) I live in Lake Merritt too and one of them is always rooting through our trash and recycling bins, even when some residents have tried asking her not to. I haven't read the article yet, but I would rather that my trash and recyclables were strictly between me and the processing plant. For one thing, we all throw out paper with loads of exploitable information. Secondly, I am f…

Humans sort it later in the process. The elderly are just sorting it a little earlier.
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