I'm not here to defend McKinsey, but sometimes the real world is complicated and requires some observation and orientation before deciding on an action [see quote and 0]. I'm not certain if McKinsey is better than trial and error, and McKinsey has likely/certainly faked solutions [1], but they are the IBM of consulting [2].

“Containerizing New York City’s 24 million daily pounds of trash and recycling is far, far more complicated than many people initially realize,” Goodman said. “How do the containers perform in winter weather, which they don’t really have in Barcelona? Who is responsible for removing snow from them on each side? How do they work on narrow streets vs. wide avenues? What about our incredible number of very dense mixed-use buildings, given that DSNY collects residential but not commercial trash?”

0. https://nyc.streetsblog.org/2022/10/03/exclu-sanitation-depa...

1. https://www.propublica.org/article/new-york-city-paid-mckins...

2. https://www.ibm.com/ibm/history/ibm100/us/en/icons/personalc...

I mean the answer to this is not as simple as "yes trash belongs in trash bins". How do you organize trash pickup? Where do these receptacles get placed? How large should they be? Is this for business and residential? Do trash routes need to change as well? NYC is massive and what will probably work in a neighborhood in Manhattan may not work for one in Staten Island. It's not at all a simple exercise.

Source, my dear friend. The world is just too weird for me delineate between real and unreal at this point.