Loyola doesn't mess around when it comes to being environmentally conscious.
When the East Residence Hall - since re-dubbed Flannery O'Connor Hall - first opened, Loyola eagerly touted it as the school's first green building. Complete with a geothermal heating and cooling system and energy-saving appliances, the relatively new residence hall is tough on environmental waste and oh-so-soft on the ozone. Oh, and Flannery O'Connor also boasts a green roof, whatever that means. Put that in your pipe and smoke it, Villanova (but not really - smoke is bad for the environment).
When Loyola installed a solar panel this past summer as a way to generate environment-loving energy for Butler and Hammerman dormitories, a great victory was won against lovers of pollution everywhere. Take that, Halliburton.
When EnviroRide popped up on campus this year, students graciously embraced the new car service as the solution to their gas-guzzling weekend "excursions."
"What's that Mercedes doing on York Road?" "Oh, you know - just saving the planet."
When the campus transitioned its old recycling program into a newer, single-stream recycling program, Loyola proudly displayed its latest environmentally-driven endeavor. We stuck it to the big, bad garbage trucks and demonstrated to manufacturers everywhere that we would no longer fear their need to package goods in glass, cardboard and plastic. Hah! With single-stream recycling, I can put my Pepsi bottles and my Easy Mac boxes in the same container. It makes saving the planet feel so good.
One question, though: Where did all the recycling bins go?
During my first year at Loyola, it was refreshing to see recycling bins scattered around the campus. Recycling bins were in Boulder; recycling bins were in the college center; recycling bins were even conveniently placed along the brick walkway that runs parallel to the Quad. This was a huge improvement over my high school's recycling initiative, which mainly consisted of round, blue tubs scattered throughout a school building, rendered utterly useless when the senior class found it funnier to use the tubs as freshmen containment units instead of paper-recycling bins. Naturally, when I came to Loyola and found that people actually cared about recycling, I was rather appreciative.
But, upon arriving on campus this year, I found missing all the recycling bins that had traditionally occupied spots on the walkway near the Quad. When I walked into the college center, I was confused; Loyola now employed single-stream recycling, and yet there still remained separate bins for paper and bottles, respectively. Those gold drums outside Boulder were playing mind games with me - everyone appeared to be putting trash in them, even though they were labeled as recycling bins. Loyola had the money to put a Salsa Rico in Primo's, but that cafeteria still lacked a single recycling container.
What happened to all the recycling bins?
In no way am I arguing that Loyola hasn't sufficiently worked to promote recycling on its campus. In September, when I interviewed Helen Schneider, assistant vice president for Campus Services who also helps coordinate a number of Loyola's environment-based operations, she informed me that the school recycles roughly 40 percent of its waste per month, a rather respectable number. But - assuming that recycling bins don't hide when I come near - what's the rationale for removing the recycling bins from areas near the Quad? And what's stopping the school from placing some bins in Primo's? Wouldn't it make sense to having recycling containers in both cafeterias?
Ultimately, Loyola could improve upon its current recycling program by doing two relatively easy things: place recycling bins in a few key areas around campus and standardize the bins. Recycling bins will be much more recognizable campus-wide if they are all one color and one shape. If those blue bins found in the college center were all over campus - and weren't designated specifically for paper or bottles - any hassle associated with recycling would be virtually eliminated.
You wouldn't even need to recycle the current blue recycling bins; just cut holes in the lids. Excuse to use a chainsaw? Why not? I'm sure we can find a solar-powered one.
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