Yesterday’s news is good for nothing except tomorrow’s garbage. And in a city the size of London, yesterday's news piles up...and up, and up.
In London nearly three million people commute daily on London’s subway system, called "the Tube." Every morning and evening, three different free tabloids are handed out to these commuters. Metro, London Lite and the London Paper, all publish free daily tabloids, which mostly cover celebrity, scandal and entertainment news.
Although 90 percent of tube stations have recycling facilities, only 40 percent of the waste generated daily actually gets recycled. As a result, three to four tons of tabloid trash is dumped into the garbage every day. It takes 12 established trees to create just one ton of newspaper, which adds up to over 15,000 trees that end up in the garbage every year.
Those numbers are just the figures from the free dailies. London also boasts nine other daily newspapers.
But thanks to a new grassroots program, called “Choose What You Read,” commuters now have the choice of turning down the London Lite in favor of a good book.
The program was founded by Alfie Boyd and Claire Wilson with the idea that they would offer an alternative to the papers “designed to depress, scare and sedate you,” said Wilson. It began as a Facebook group, which grew so quickly the founders decided to take their idea to the streets. On the first Monday of every month, the program distributes piles of free books to central London’s busiest tube stations: Westminster, Liverpool Street, Euston, Paddington and Waterloo. Each of the books’ jackets is adorned with a purple “Choose What You Read” sticker and are offered to commuters beside the free tabloid stands.
When people are finished with a book, rather than throwing it out, they are encouraged to sign their name to a list of readers on a sticker inside the book, and either return it on the first Monday or bring it to a designated drop box located centrally.
All of the books in circulation were donated by friends and members of the public.
“They don’t generally get thrown away by people, they just go back into circulation,” said Boyd.
This program is recycling at its best and a nod to the era of P2P (peer to peer) sharing. It is also a shining example of how individuals can identify a problem and make a real change in the world. Perhaps it will also raise awareness about the waste the tabloids are creating daily.
“It’s possible to do something about things that bother you,” said Wilson. “After the first hand-out we were practically high on feeling we'd changed the world. But even though we might not have done that, if we've just got 20 people to change their minds about taking the free papers, that's already a great thing to have done.”
Source: BecauseAction.com
