The BigBelly cans are great, and I’ve definitely noticed less trash on the ground on blocks that have them. Now we just need more of them. The first wave was rolled out in the downtown Center City district and a few more were placed along nearby business corridors, but they still haven’t found their way to outlying neighborhoods. Every subway station really needs one or two of these, too.

I’ve seen them around. It’s such a good idea.

What a great idea! Would love to see this in Cincinnati where I live. I hate seeing those overflowing trash cans. Just makes the place look like bad. 

such a great idea

Philly seemed to move from a testing phase to full deployment of these pretty swiftly. They are fantastic – can’t argue with the stats!

Yes it’s a great idea, but I’d like see more about the economics. According to the company @ http://tinyurl.com/lv33klFacing a $1.4 billion, five-year budget deficit, the city estimates it
will save $875,000 a year with the compactors, bought with state grant
money. So they’ll save $4,375,000 over five years. Not chump change, if it’s accurate. And that doesn’t include the cost. How much did the 500 compactors cost?

Thank you all for your supportive comments! For more details on the economics and the story, please see the case study, posted at: http://bigbellysolar.com/case-studies/casestudies.html (the top one). The City is financing the equipment cost over 3 years so they will save nearly $1 million a year even after paying the equipment costs, adding up to about $13 million over 10 years.  So the point is, both in the immediate term and in the long run, it’s cheaper for the City to replace all 700 trash cans downtown with solar compactors and recyclers than to continue business as usual.  The progam also freed up 24 of the 33 workers to be redeployed to recycling from trash collection.  More detail in news articles like this one from the Associated Press on MSNBC: http://bigbellysolar.com/news/207/philadelphia-likes-solar-powered-bigbelly  Also check out the City’s ambitious plans to go green at: http://www.phila.gov/green/greenworks/index.html 

Cool. Thanks for adding some more to the story. It’s especially good to hear that the city found a way to keep those who would otherwise have lost their jobs by moving them from trash collection to recycling. That’s another win-win.

A major flaw with these trashcans is the design of them. Having to grab a handle adds an additional step to throwing away trash and also puts germophobic urbanites at risk for a mystery virus (an increasing trend, ie. hand sanitizer/wipes for shoppers at many stores and offices for keyboards, phones, etc.). And these things do get disgusting and they break easily, not to mention the non-eco friendly aspects of the manufacturing, replacement and disposal of the solar panels, which use a lot of silicon.