After introducing green bins to households in 2006, Vaughan extends service to condos

In line with single-family households

Yorkregion.com
April 21, 2021
Dina Al-Shibeeb

Condo residents in Vaughan will soon be able to throw their organic materials in green bins, the city said April 19.

Extension of the green bin program, which was introduced to single-family homes in 2006, is expected to be completed in phases over two years. It comes after Vaughan council approved staff report recommendations last November to harmonize its organic collection program in apartment buildings or condos with that of residents in single-family homes.

“Starting in April, the city is expanding its weekly green bin collection to multi-residential buildings in Vaughan that receive municipal waste collection,” the city said. “Bringing the organic waste collection into condos and apartments will allow solid waste service levels to be in line with single-family households.”

Of the current 94 multi-residential buildings receiving recycling and garbage collection in Vaughan, one-third of them have either an existing private organics program or a three-stream waste sorting system for garbage, recycling and organics. “This group will be the first to receive this new service,” the city said.

About 33 per cent of Vaughan buildings have a tri-sorter to process garbage, organics and recycling, while 48 per cent have single-chute garbage and 19 per cent have a mix of infrastructure.

For example, the Halifax Regional Municipality had its green bin collection in urban areas since 1998 while Windsor will begin the program officially in 2022.

York Region, meanwhile, implemented a green bin program in 2007. Markham had become the region's first to do so as part of its "Mission Green" in the fall of 2004 with implementation to 12,500 single-family residences. In July 2005, Markham’s green bin program was expanded city-wide.

Toronto began its program in the Etobicoke area in 2002 until the entire city was fully covered in 2005, and Peel started in 2007.