How to dump 3000 pounds of confetti on Times Square
nytimes.com
nytimes.com
I think they are attributing too much to confetti -- how does one minute of dropping paper at the end of the event transform an hours long event to something less seedy? I think the big push to clean up the Times Square area that started around then is the real reason the event became less seedy.
https://petapixel.com/assets/uploads/2018/01/timessquarenewy...
Probably difficult to imagine why, especially for people who don’t expect this from crowded city events.
Some people like it like that.
Just seems like large crowds of people on the street? Not sure what you think the photo shows.
https://gizmodo.com/ask-the-project-manager-for-cleveland-s-...
I understand how this entertains people momentarily but I still don't understand why people are choosing to waste this much in general...
> More than 100 sanitation workers begin their eight-hour shifts. Using street sweepers, backpack blowers, and push brooms, they will remove the 57 tons of material that’s left behind
This is actually disgusting. I think the idea that dropping confetti prevents violence, or that it was responsible for the drop in violence the article attributes to it, seems silly. It sounds like they are just trying to justify the massive expense and waste associated with this reckless behavior.
Of course the owner of the company who gets paid mad money to dump trash on the public is going to tout his works as transformative and important. Does his company also pay for the 100 sanitation workers to clean up his mess? Or do the people foot the bill for both the dumping of the trash and the cleanup?
And now a million people get to enjoy it as an enhancement to their evening.
It's fun and pretty, and sanitation apparently has no problems cleaning it all up afterwards.
As long as there are no direct personal consequences from type of needless waste, a large segment of the population will just keep on doing it. They'll be dead long before the consequences hit, after all.
Edit: However, it should be noted that the confetti is made from waste paper and is biodegradable. I still think it could be put to a better use, but it's not like they're dumping a load of plastic on the streets.
That still leaves 57 tons of trash that isn't recycled, though. What a waste.
Humans are strange.
1. dump a large pile of confetti in Times Square.
2. Argue the second law of thermodynamics until the ball drops.
3. Watch as the American Journal of Physics grudgingly publishes your paper with a long-winded preface on just how aggravating your approach made parking that year.
4. Win a sanitation award.
5. Spend the rest of your days running from the reanimated corpse of Max Planck.
If there's no reasonable legal definition of biodegradable, then isn't that label useless?
The article makes no mention of the other garbage the accumulates as a bypoduct of this event, much of which is not biodegradable.
What is the point of dumping this garbage in the street?
Alternative: do not pay the cleaners if they can't do enough useful work (without artificially increasing it for no gain) - their wage comes from the taxpayers after all (I presume) who pay them in order to get a specific work done, not for charity.
There are about 200 unemployed New York subway construction workers who would love a job where they get paid to do nothing.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/28/nyregion/new-york-subway-...
An accountant discovered the discrepancy while reviewing the budget for new train platforms under Grand Central Terminal in Manhattan.
The budget showed that 900 workers were being paid to dig caverns for the platforms as part of a 3.5-mile tunnel connecting the historic station to the Long Island Rail Road. But the accountant could only identify about 700 jobs that needed to be done, according to three project supervisors. Officials could not find any reason for the other 200 people to be there.
“Nobody knew what those people were doing, if they were doing anything,” said Michael Horodniceanu, who was then the head of construction at the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which runs transit in New York. The workers were laid off, Mr. Horodniceanu said, but no one figured out how long they had been employed. “All we knew is they were each being paid about $1,000 every day.”
Both companies should keep track of what resources are assigned where and paid for.
In fact, it makes a point of it.
> More than 100 sanitation workers begin their eight-hour shifts. Using street sweepers, backpack blowers, and push brooms, they will remove the 57 tons of material that’s left behind, none of which is recycled.
It’s NYC. There are no alleyways so the garbage usually ends up on the sidewalk. Smells just wonderful in the summertime. A few tons of confetti on the street is a drop in the bucket.
With free and unvalued labour.