"Scott en Aztlán" wrote:

On 28 Mar 2005 11:36:28 -0800, wrote:

I also find it interesting that in your area of CA you can just mix all
the recyclables together. It's very unusual to see paper mixed with
glass, cans etc. I would think this would make a big mess to try to
sort out. More typical is to have it seperated:

newpaper
mixed other paper
glass/cans/plastic

To clarify: The "usually observed rule" is to put different materials
into different bags (even placing office-grade paper in separate bags).

I've never observed that rule. In fact, I've never heard of it.

I've heard of it being done that way, but I certainly wouldn't be willing to
go to that much trouble -- probably what everybody else thought too. We (as a
city) pay extra to have stuff recycled. What that means is that we have fewer
than 5 gallons of trash to pay for every week, which is not bad.

I have always tossed all the recyclables into the barrel together.
Cans and bottles are usually thrown in loose, newspapers are often
(but not always) placed inside paper grocery bags, and shredded office
paper is contained in plastic garbage bags. Waste Management has never
complained.

Everything -- paper, plastic, metal, glass -- gets tossed loose into the
recycling bin, which is picked up by one of those huge automated trucks.
Every once in a while there's a picture in the paper of conveyor belts filled
with trash being sorted by white-garbed and -masked workers. I guess there
are worse jobs, but I wouldn't want one any more than the welfare louts do.

I wonder how they deal with all the broken glass, which it almost has to be by
the time the truck is nearly full.

--
Cheers,
Bev
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~
"Why put fault tolerance in the OS, when it's already built
into the User?" -- Steve Shaw, regarding Win95