15 Foot Toss
This past week my friend and I were fortunate enough to receive an invitation to the Spruce Meadows National Tournament. Upon arrival to the grounds I was quite impressed by the effort Spruce Meadows had taken to encourage recycling throughout the park. Every food location we found had one or more recycling and trash bins set up directly beside each other. With the bins so close and readily available, it seemed almost impossible that anyone could justify tossing their bottles. But how far are people willing to go in order to recycle? Being the curious individuals we are, my friend Tyler and I decided to conduct our own social experiment over lunch. This social experiment shocked us, and led us to realize just how bad people’s attitudes towards recycling in our city are.
Fifteen steps was all it took. Moving one of the recycling bins fifteen steps away from the garbage completely eliminated the number of bottles being thrown into it. Over the course of our one hour lunch, we watched the slaughter unfold in front of our eyes. Bottle after bottle fell. After the first painful hour, forty-five bottles had fallen at the hands of the shameless tossers. The most shocking thing we witnessed was that not one person walked the extra distance to recycle. Are people truly that lazy? Do they have that little time? Do they not understand how to recycle?
If people aren’t willing to take fifteen extra steps to recycle then Alberta is in trouble. Imagine how many bottles are thrown out downtown every day because of the lack of recycling units. It comes down to individual effort in the end. Each one of us needs to take those extra steps in order to fix our recycling attitude!
-Ty and Rob