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Comment by cimmanom | Hacker News Reader

It's dumb for light items, absolutely.

But New Yorkers tend to carry their groceries home in their hands for as far as a mile, instead of wheeling them out in carts to a car trunk and then carrying them 20 feet to the door of the house.

Heavy items (liquids and canned goods and stuff like potatoes) WILL tear through plastic bags if not double bagged. The worst offenders are half gallons of milk/juice, which have sharp corners.

This has happened to me more than once. I've also on occasion just made it home with a bag that's seconds from splitting open.

And then you're half a mile from home with your groceries all over the sidewalk and nothing to put them in.

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At least in Europe, since the introduction of the bag surcharge, the new plastic bags are thicker and much stronger. At most, they get punctured, but I have never had one break open on me.

The grocery store I grew up shopping at (in NY) also had thicker bags, but they were still vulnerable to punctures, which would turn into tears under the wrong conditions. They used to put a paper bag (no handles) inside a plastic bag (with handles) - which turns out to be super sturdy. You could carry cannonballs in those things, except that you could feel the handles stretch out after a few blocks.

In Finland there are small biodegradable plastic bags available in grocery stores. Free of charge. They're mainly for vegetables, fruit etc.

Downside is that they are weak enough to break if mishandled.

Bigger bags to hold all your purchases - made from recycled plastic - are available from the cashiers for 20 cents.

Edit: Regular small bags are also available free of charge.

Almost everyone in South Australia uses reusable grocery bags, like this: https://www.google.com.au/search?q=reusable+bag&tbm=isch&sou...

We keep them in the car or carry a collapsible one in a backpack, handbag, laptop bag, etc.

Right. A lot of us have started carrying those, but not everyone. And even the slimmest ones have some bulk. I wouldn't carry more than one in a handbag unless I were leaving the house explicitly to shop for groceries. But sometimes you stop by the store for one thing on the way home and end up leaving with a lot more.

Even the super strong HDPE bags at "luxury" grocery stores like Citarella, Grace's Market, Agata and Valentina, etc., get double bagged for absolutely no reason other than this is what the people who shop at these places have come to expect. It is long, long past time for NYC to impose a charge on plastic bags. My wife and I are honestly the only people who bring their own bags to Citarella.

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