As giant trash bins come to NYC, will the city’s garbage heaps become a thing of the past?

Four container bins sitting at the corner of West 41st Street and 7th Avenue in Times Square may look simple, but they have a lofty purpose: Showing New Yorkers how the city streets could become cleaner and garbage-free.

In April, Mayor Eric Adams announced that the city’s long-stalled Clean Curb program has launched a pilot where garbage bags can be placed in container bins ahead of being picked up by sanitation crews — an alternative to piling the trash on the city’s sidewalks. The pilot is the beginning of what Sanitation Commissioner Jessica Tisch hopes will eventually be a city like Barcelona or Paris, full of bins where residents and visitors can dispose of their garbage and recycling bags instead of dumping them on the street in huge heaps.

But as the summer heat conducts its annual trash bake, filling New York nostrils with pungent aromas, some might be wondering when these new-age bins will land on their corner — and if a $1.3 million program is enough to tackle the garbage piles. Sanitation spokesperson Vincent Gragnani told Gothamist last week that they expect several more containers to be installed in the different neighborhoods this summer and fall, but couldn’t provide new information on the locations.

For the program to succeed, city officials will be looking at metrics like participation rates, cleanliness scores, maintenance feasibility and monitoring the “rat count,” Gragnani said.

One big question is where the bins will be placed. The Times Square bins are located in the roadway of Seventh Avenue, a model that would mean giving up more parking spaces in a city that’s been historically reluctant to do so. Sidewalk placements may take away walking space from pedestrians.

Sidewalks are already a primary target of New Yorkers’ complaints when it comes to trash. Over the last three years, New Yorkers have called the 311 hotline about 488,000 times to file complaints with DSNY. About half of those concerns — 46% — mention sidewalks as the site of issues like dirty conditions, broken glass or overflowing garbage cans. And one in 10 of those DSNY complaints involve dirty conditions and obstructions created by trash.

That’s part of a suite of new sanitation activities coming this year. Tisch and Adams held a publicity event on Monday to tout their plans to crack down on illegal dumping in the South Bronx and sanitation wins in the recently approved budget. Among the list of funds is $4.8 million for rodent mitigation, including the development of new “rat-proof litter baskets” and developing a unified approach to “containerization.”

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