For clarification, this isn’t about residential trash bins people put out on the curb for collection (which is what I thought at first because of the photo accompanying the article) but the permanent receptacles at street corners and public parks.
The wireless tech signaling when a can is full is a dumb, needlessly complicated idea for a lot of reasons though. Most of the time when the corner trash cans are overflowing it’s not because the city didn’t know they needed attention, it’s because the city doesn’t have the will or the resources to empty all the public trash cans as frequently as we’d all like them to.
Well whether or not it works out in the real world, that’s actually part of the justification for this project on paper. The marketing materials from companies like Bigbelly claim that the smart system allows the sanitation department to optimize their collection pickups and reduce labor by 70-80%. I’m sure that’s a gross exaggeration. But even a small reduction in labor due to efficiency gains adds up to a lot of money over the lifetime of the cans. (Enough to cover the increased cost? Maybe not)
Also, if you’re going with covered cans to keep out critters and reduce windblown trash, not having a sensor means physically opening the can to see if it’s getting full, so it’s not really a given right now that the sanitation department knows which ones need to be emptied.
I bet a clever designer could come up with a mechanically triggered indicator visible from the outside of the can that didn’t involve expensive and easily damaged electronics.
For example, my barbecue had a simple spring-based thingy to estimate how much fuel was left in a can of propane.
Yeah I’m not buying that for a second either. That means they’re saying “a typical trash pickup crew could collect 4-5 times as much garbage per shift if they weren’t wasting so much time driving around to see which bins had trash in them.” That is simply not reflective of how sanitation work actually goes in real life.
As a mechanical engineer I’d love to agree with you, but what matters in a trash can is available volume, not weight. A can that’s full of lightweight packing material still needs to be emptied. Also, loathe as I am to admit it, even if you came up with a reliable clever mechanical device that can detect volume, there’s no way it could be built as cheaply as a sensor these days.
Of course you could always just add a transparent window in the side, but someone would need to clean it periodically.
Yeah I mean there’s nothing wrong with putting some amount of civic pride into the aesthetics of a public trash can just like you might with a street lamp or park bench, but form should still follow function.
Efficiency isn’t the only concern though. The main point of waste disposal is hygiene and sanitation.
Why not just empty them, even if they aren’t full yet? That’s how it goes in the UK, and it doesn’t require a sensor. Say the bin lorry comes around once a week, and rejects a bin that contains some waste, but isn’t full yet. You’re just leaving the existing waste to fester for another week. There’s also the risk that the bin will be over full when the lorry comes around next week, which takes even more effort to clear up.
The “conceptual designs” from the Institute For Creative Integration are worth a look. I have to say, they do look indeed look kinda sexy… if you were designing a cigarette lighter. The middle one looks like it would sit very well in the hip pocket of some skin-tight jeans.
Sometimes you may need to empty certain bins more frequently though, and can’t always assume that a fixed interval is sufficient. I used to have a summer job working for a city that involved emptying trash bins at parks, so I have some firsthand experience in this area. Trust me: having to deal with an overflowing trash bin at the dog park on a hot summer day is not something anyone ever wants to deal with. (I still have nightmares about it.) A sensor that alerts sanitation workers before it gets to that point would be great, if it can be implemented at a reasonable cost.
I wonder how much more it is costing to over-engineer a trash can compared to just paying more sanitation workers to empty the less aesthetic trash cans on a more optimal schedule? Like wouldn’t the job creation also be a boon in the latter solution?
full disclosure: I have no specialized insight into this kind of thing.
