Megabin documents

Original data collected from the public

In 2005, the City of Toronto carried out a three-month test of monster billboards disguised as garbage cans. I filed an access-to-information request and provide this public data for the purposes of research and criticism. There is no viable way to research the data or criticize it without viewing it in totum.

HTML versions

  1. Online survey (1.9 MB file)
  2. Telephone survey
  3. In-person survey (“streeters”)

The files are in HTML 4.01 Strict with extremely modest CSS. There’s no way to make this much data look great in a browser.

Original data files

A zip archive is available (2.6 MB) of the original Excel data file, plus outputs of the online, telephone, and streeter surveys in tab-delimited text (Unix linebreaks), Dbase IV, HTML, and SYLK.

Staff report

Richard Butts, General Manager, Solid Waste Management Services, City of Toronto, authored a report for the Works Committee entitled “Test Results of New Recycling/Litter Bins” (dated 2006.01.03). Also for the purpose of research and criticism, I provide it here in various formats:

  1. HTML 4.01 Strict (with a few mangled words due to conversion – I fixed nearly all such errors, but a few remain)
  2. Original Microsoft Word document, with some of the strangest permissions and limitations I have seen
  3. Tagged PDF

(Added 2006.01.16.)

Report by Northstar Research

The staff report states that Northstar Research was hired to interpret the survey data acquired online, via telephone, and in person. Their report for the City of Toronto, entitled “Public Response to New Recycling/Litter Bins” and again provided for research and criticism, is available, albeit in several inconvenient formats:

  1. Original PowerPoint (yes)
  2. PDF (tagged, but not very well)
  3. Zip file of PowerPoint-exported HTML, which is pretty terrible but viewable by many people in certain browsers
  4. RTF text-only version (with no figures or tables)

(Added 2006.01.17.)

‘Test results of new recycling/litter bins: Action taken by the Committee’

This letter, dated 2006.01.17, was sent to “all interested parties” by City Hall concerning the Works Committee’s next steps. (Added 2006.01.27.)

See also

Read my Weblog entries on megabins.

Posted: 2006.01.13 ¶ Updated: 2006.01.16, 17, 27; 2006.03.19