If Brooklyn’s So Cool, Why Does Manhattan Still Dump All Of Its Trash Here?
This could be us but… it already is
Brooklyn may have launched a million trend pieces over the past decade (and become home to the best neighborhood ever for millenials), but you know what it’s also home to? Manhattan’s trash. Lots of it. In fact, Williamsburg and Greenpoint have the highest concentration of garbage dumps of anywhere in the city, per data from the New York Public Interest Group. Feeling good about what you pay for your apartment yet?
Bedford + Bowery reports that a group called Organization United for Trash Reduction & Garbage Equity (OUTRAGE, for short), is pressing the city to speed up plans to add three garbage transfer stations in Manhattan, citing statistics that 50 percent of truck traffic through North Brooklyn’s major intersections is comprised of garbage trucks.
“Williamsburg is now the celebrated, hip place to live. Residential space is increasing, adding and overcrowding the population here,” said OUTRAGE co-founder David Dobosz. “People are all worried about the truck traffic.” The group also has the support of councilman Antonio Reynoso, who said at a press conference, “In Brooklyn, one thing we’re good at is that we talk trash. It’s about time [de Blasio] starts talking trash, too.”
It’s a dicey argument to get into, saying that Williamsburg shouldn’t have dumps now that it’s gotten expensive and hip—we bet the Upper East Side residents fighting tooth and nail against a proposed transfer station at 91st st. would say something similar about their situation—but yes, a disproportionate trash burden on Williamsburg, Greenpoint, or any other neighborhood is a problem well worth fixing. Plus, hard to argue against any group with an acronym as good as OUTRAGE’s. Trash politics aside, gotta give credit where it’s due.
Follow Virginia K. Smith on Twitter @vksmith.
