No matter where you look nowadays, you cannot fail to avoid recycling initiatives. Gone are the days when we used to put everything out together for the rubbish people to take. Now we are well versed in separating everything out so the right things go in the right bins and as much as possible gets recycled.
But what do you do when you are out and about? Very few of us take our rubbish back home to sort out; instead we tend to put it in whatever rubbish bin is nearest.
Things could be about to change though, if Manchester Airport’s initiative takes hold and has a wider reaching effect. It has just installed a large number of new recycle bins across the whole airport, to encourage travellers to get rid of all the waste they might have with them more responsibly.
Apparently Manchester Airport is not the first place that has installed these bins. But it does claim the honour of being the first airport to have them. You can be fairly sure that now they have led the way, other airports across the country will start to follow suit very soon.
The bins themselves are quite eye catching, and it is easy enough to tell what part of the bins you need to put your rubbish in. There is a slot on one side which has a blue surround, and this is designed to accept newspapers and other similar paper products. On the other side there is a round hole with an orange surround, which is meant to accept plastic bottles. And in the middle there is a general waste receptacle for anything else you might want to dispose of.
There are one hundred and twenty five bins in all, which is a great number for an airport the size of Manchester. The easy colour coding and shape of the bins makes it easy for everyone to use them – there are no signs to read which would have to appear in several languages.
Some of them are positioned near the departure gates, as people tend to be waiting here for a long time and can get through some drinks or papers while they wait. But they are dotted around all areas of the airport, so there is every opportunity to use them and help the airport to attain a better recycling record.
The real question now is how long it will be before the rest of the airports in the UK follow Manchester Airport’s lead. It isn’t likely to be long, because Manchester Airport has received a lot of positive publicity thanks to the new bins. That would undoubtedly apply to every other airport that invests in them as well, which is always a good thing.
The price tag for all those bins hasn’t been revealed, but they are part of an £80 million pound facelift for the terminals at the airport. If they can save a lot of items from being wasted when they could be recycled, it would be worth every penny.