The East York-Riverdale Mirror

It all began in the late 1960s and early '70s when a small group of environmentalists created Pollution Probe and the Toronto Recycling Action Committee, which began to educate the public on the new three Rs of reduce, reuse and recycle.

By 1975, 10 recycling depots operated by volunteers were set up in Metro Toronto and by 1978, East York had its own municipally run recycling program.

By the 1980s, a new "R" was added to the recycling formula and that was "recover," which was the goal to reclaim as much recyclable material as possible.

It was through this initiative that the blue box program was developed by Jack McGinnis and other pioneers in Ontario's recycling movement, which was first implemented in this province and now used by more than 70 million people throughout North America.

Despite being a strong supporter of a green, pesticide-free environment in which recycling is a matter-of-fact occurrence, I was appalled at the blue monster sitting on my front porch this week.

Foisted upon us as a better way to recycle, the new blue bins represent a huge step backward in the promotion of recycling in this city as it is an imposition rather than a constructive tool of real conservation.

I'm six-foot two-inches tall, 210 pounds and physically active, but I had an awful time wrestling the empty bin into my house, so I can just imagine its weight when full.

The city says I can keep it outside, but my backyard is now full of snow, my front porch is too small and there is no room at the side of the house.

Looking up and down the street where I live I see that far too many of my neighbours are in the same state as I am, which shows how poorly planned this expensive and ill-advised program has been.

If you take a look at the city's own website, nobody knows what the actual benefits are going to be, with a guesstimate of 10 per cent improved efficiently offered without any real foundation.

The bins are the property of the City of Toronto, so my decision is to return it to its proper owner as I simply do not have the room to store this huge blue mistake and frankly I can probably do a better job of recycling with my own efforts.

The whole purpose of recycling was to make the pile on the curb as small as possible, not roll out huge bins of material without any thought as to why so much pointless waste occurs in our society.

Let's start at the source, not the destination, for real green recycling solutions.