Recycling Program Launched : Targets Provided for Can Chuckers at Beach

Although local forecasters aren’t even close to predicting a dramatic cold front moving into the San Diego area, eight igloos will appear at San Diego city beaches today.

The 6-foot-tall, hollow structures commonly called igloos are part of a new beach aluminum-can recycling program called Bins on the Beaches.

Created by the City of San Diego Waste Management Department and the Department of Parks and Recreation, the “Bins on the Beach” program will be launched near the entrance to the Belmont Park Plunge at 11 a.m. Councilwoman Judy McCarty and radio station XTRA-FM (91X) have been invited to the event, along with other members of the City Council.

“I think most people want to recycle and it is up to us to make the opportunity,” said McCarty, chairwoman of the San Diego Assn. of Governments’ Regional Recycling Strategy Committee. She predicted that by bringing recycling bins closer to the popular point of consumption, the beaches will be cleaner and otherwise discarded aluminum cans will be recycled.

The Waste Management Department has contracted with the Irvine-based 20/20 Recycle Centers to put out and maintain the igloos, which can hold up to 400 pounds of aluminum cans. The Irvine-based firm has agreed to donate all profits to the San Diego Ecology Center, a not-for-profit recycling advocacy organization.

Rock station 91X plans to promote the beach recycling program by rewarding those who recycle the cans with $3,000 in prizes over the period of three weekends, starting today. The prizes range from stickers to movie passes to beverage containers.

Although organizers have made no estimates of the volume of cans the pilot program will collect, they are optimistic that people will cooperate. Mick Gammon of the city’s Waste Management Department said that, if the program is successful, it could be expanded next summer and possibly also move into the city parks.

The eight aluminum-can recycling igloos will be at Belmont Park near the entrance to the Plunge; the west end of Brighton Street, near the beach parking lot at Ocean Beach; the parking lot at the end of South Mission Beach; the west end of Grand Avenue in Pacific Beach; the parking lot near the beach at La Jolla Shores; near the boat ramp area in Ski Beach north of Sea World and Bonita Cove across the street from Belmont Park, where there are two.