Here is an infrastructure investment America should consider: an Envac waste disposal system. Instead of filling our streets with garbage bags and waiting for trucks to pick them up, many European cities (they invest in infrastructure that isn't for cars there) are trying out these clever underground vacuum systems. Garbage is separated into "fractions"- paper, organics, or other garbage, deposited in chutes where it is held until a computer opens the gate at the bottom of the tube and sucks a particular fraction down the pipe to a processing center.
The lifeblood of the 169 Tompkins development. Such a system implemented at the scale of a single NYC block can be done quickly and cheaply. It will curtail transportation costs and boost efficiency, allowing municipal garbage waste trucks to collect an entire block's waste load from a single location. Truck routes will accelerate, and physically disposing of waste will become a swift and easy procedure for residents. Additionally, once that waste is pooled, it may be then recycled not just for the city, but more ideally for reuse in the block's own community-run renewable energy systems.
