Day 1118

The city's decision to build a new marine transfer station here on Gravesend Bay, part of an effort to "distribute garbage disposal across the city more equitably", has angered many in the community. No surprise there. Everyone wants to continue producing ridiculous amounts of waste, but no one wants the disposal of that waste to affect them in any way. But the new twist here is that, in addition to the standard NIMBY concerns about such a project — truck traffic, air quality, odor, noise — the transfer station's opponents have come up with a novel argument: that some unexploded anti-aircraft shells that fell overboard in 1954 may be lurking on the floor of the bay and could be accidentally detonated by the dredging that will occur during construction. (Starting at the bottom of this page, the Department of Sanitation explains why this is not a significant issue.)

But really, I'm all for nixing the transfer station. Since nobody wants to live near such a place, I say we should just shut down all the waste handling facilities in the city and let people wallow in their own filth until they find a way to produce less of it.