[1] Looking like fugitives from a factory floor, at least
1,000 55-gallon drums dotted Central Park in the 1980s,
marring what may be the greatest invented landscape in
[4] America. They were big — not to mention unsightly — but not
big enough to contain all the cans, bottles, cups, napkins,
newspapers, magazines, paper bags, pizza boxes, hot-dog
[7] wrappers and other refuse from 12 million visitors a year.
Trash piled up in them and around them. To help keep up with
the overflowing cans, rear-loading garbage trucks lumbered
[10] back and forth like dinosaurs across lawns and meadows, hills
and valleys, paths and walkways. It was a brutish way to treat
what was supposed to be a green gem. No wonder the park felt
[13] out of control.
Today, Central Park is a far different place. The
number of visitors has soared to 42 million visitors annually.
[16] They generate 2,000 tons of trash and 58 tons of recyclables a
year. Despite all that garbage, it is possible to drive around the
sprawling park and count the pieces of stray litter on two
[19] hands. In place of 55-gallon drums and 68-gallon plastic bins
are neat arrays of handsome, patented, coated-aluminum
receptacles with 32-gallon plastic bags inside. The cans are
[22] colored black for garbage, gray for bottles and cans, and green
for paper and cardboard. Instead of being serviced by ungainly
rear-loaders, the receptacles are emptied day and night by
[25] workers scooting around in 86 small carts. They take the bags
to one of eight pickup areas in the 843-acre park, from which
the bags are hauled to transfer stations in the Bronx and
[28] Queens.
Internet: <www.nytimes.com> (adapted).
Judge the following item about the ideas and the meaning of the previous text.
In Central Park today garbage cans are painted according to their sizes.
