Garbage, that is: Residents don’t want the city to reactive a waste-transfer station on 91st Street at the East River. Which is weird, because most people want their neighborhood filled with more vermin and odors. Upper East Siders have based their complaint on socioeconomic grounds, though, which is a little problematic: While it’s true, as the Gracie Point Community Council points out, that many of the residents in the immediate vicinity of the proposed site are low-income minorities, the median income in Yorkville at large is far higher than that of other waste-transfer stations throughout the city — none of which are yet in Manhattan. In fact, says the Times, the Yorkville site was “intended to redress the disproportionate number of waste stations in poorer neighborhoods,” including Williamsburg/Greenpoint, disproportionately. So maybe the UES garbage will in fact be followed by so many authenticity-seeking 22-year-olds and rehearsal spaces that residents will forget the noise, smells, and rattiness of the garbage.
In Fight Against Trash Station, Upper East Side Cites Injustice [NYT]
