apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

Ok, this is a noble effort, but why can't Houston buy it's own recycle bins? Perhaps they need a little tax on the oil companies based there?

i moved to houston 8 months ago from dallas.

let's just say that pollution and the lack of recycling is a huge problem here. it's sad because houston has so much green spaces, et cetera but the pollution is so bad that my outdoor plants are covered with soot. (granted, i live in an apartment complex next to a freeway)

this doesn't surprise me the least.

Here here, Gail. I think the oil companies foster kind of anti-green feelings here. How pathetic that another city makes the effort to chip in! (For the record, I have relatives in the industry. People are always blaming FIL for the prices, which I find amusing even though he doesn't. Incedentally he's a geophysicist who has been saying for years that the supply in easy-to-drill places is dwindling.)

The good news is that there is a very strong drive for recycling and other green options in some Houston communities. We have the Abitibi paper retrievers which use the recyclables to raise money for schools, and they recently put up a plastic/metal one near my grocery store, so I can now have a very big part of my trash recycled. (No glass, though, unfortunately.) My company has started allowing people to take 4-day weeks to cut down on commute gas (wish they would allow some telecommuting though, or I wouldn't be sitting here with no work to do on Friday afternoon.)

But the lack of recycling is the least of Houston's problems. The real biggie is transportation. I live in the burbs because that's where I work, and while I wouldn't walk - Houstonites are insane drivers, and I know people who have died this way, no joke - I ride with my husband, and it's a short way to work. A lot of people I know have hideous commutes. They live far from work, ride alone, then bitch about the traffic, hilariously. As this article states, there is no zoning in Houston so the sprawl is just awful, making it very difficult to make efficient public transportation. We do have a commuter park-and-ride downtown which gets lots of use. I wish it ran on weekends. We also now have a light rail downtown; I'm not sure how much of a success it has been, or if revamping the bus system wouldn't have done just as well, but anyway there's a little bit of an effort going on.

I think the rise in gas prices is going to bring about some much-needed change. There's talk of starting a commuter rail along an existing line along my street, which would be cool. It's slated to be in use 2030, but ... (sigh) baby steps, baby steps. It's going to be a real problem, though, trying to retrofit a sensible transportation plan to this unplanned city.

There are also a lot of high-rise communities going up downtown which hopefully will bring people a little closer to where they work. There's also been a lot of backlash against them. The old money that lives around Rice University has been griping about the Ashby high-rise under construction nearby and the traffic it will no doubt bring. While it irks me that they think they can preserve their little bit of suburbia in the middle of the city while so many people have to drive so damn long to work, I concede that there will be growing pains if urban areas become denser. The infrastructure is not there to support all these newcomers. It's a mess.

In the meanwhile, the oil-fed in-laws are wondering why we're still living in our little apartment near work, why don't we buy one of those giant houses on exurbian frontier, those new communities on the cheap land with their stick-excuses for trees. They admitted I was right not to get the SUV. But it still feels like I'm swimming up-bayou a lot of the time. Honestly, we're not all jacked-up-F-350-drivers. But there sure are a lot among us.