I have lived in Cedar City for two and a half years while attending SUU, and while I have enjoyed my stay, there has been one glaring issue for me: Cedar City does not have many convenient options for its citizens to recycle.
Recycling is usually one of the easiest options to reduce waste, but when walking around the city, or even on the campus, there are almost no recycling bins and very few drop-off points for citizens to leave their recycling. In fact, before typing this up, I did not even realize the city had any drop-off points.
With Southern Utah University being the “University of the Parks,” it is a little surprising to me that we would not take greater steps to try to reduce the waste we produce. Just about everyone here loves to go around and explore the natural wonders of Southern Utah, so much so that we are known for it. Despite this, our lack of easy options for recycling results in waste that goes on to damage these environments that we love so much.
Having the recycling “binnies” [which are located at Home Depot, Soccer Field Parking Lot (685 North – West Side of the Cemetery), Cedar Middle School, Canyon View Middle School, SUU Tennis Courts and Smith’s, around the town is definitely a step in the right direction. That said, the city would recycle significantly more if it was made even more convenient for its residents. People are much more likely to recycle if they can simply drop the item into a recycling bin right next to whatever trash they are throwing away. People are lazy and often don’t think about it, so not many citizens will likely store all of their recyclable items so that they can later drop them off.
I know I certainly don’t think about it as often as I should.
Submitted by: Alexander Schilling, SUU Student
Photo by: Paweł Czerwiński on Unsplash.com
