NYC officials have installed trash cans—including in the Bronx—specifically designed for pizza boxes to ward off the Pizza Rat.
NYC Parks Commissioner Sue Donoghue announced Friday that the trash cans have been engineered to handle awkwardly shaped pizza boxes, which are difficult to fit into a typical city trash can without folding them into a haphazard piece of origami art. The new receptacles have been installed in five city parks including Loreto Playground, located on Morris Park Avenue in the Bronx.
The pizza boxes must be empty before they go into the bins. Parks officials said they hope to keep park trash overflow at bay by keeping pizza boxes separate from other trash.
According to Parks, separating food waste and empty pizza boxes will also lessen the food sources available to area rodents.
A park in each borough, officials say, will have the new rectangular-shaped bins. The initiative allows visitors to simply slide their empty pizza boxes into a dedicated container, rather than “forcing” the rectangular boxes into circular bins.
“Whether you’re relaxing after caring for your local garden, taking in a Movie Under the Stars, or just connecting with your neighbors, few things are more quintessentially New York than enjoying a slice of pizza in one of our public parks,” Donoghue said. “We all know that you shouldn’t try to fit a square peg into a round hole, which is why we’re deploying special trash cans just for pizza boxes to parks throughout the five boroughs.”
Which parks will have pizza box trash bins?
Other than Loreto Playground, the bins have been installed at Saratoga Park in Brooklyn, Father Demo Square in Manhattan, Sobelsohn Playground in Queens, and Jennifer’s Playground on Staten Island.
The bins, designed in-house by the Parks Department, are reminiscent of the classic red-and-white checkered tablecloths so often found in traditional NYC pizza joints and Italian restaurants.
Deputy Mayor for Operations Meera Joshi, who supports the initiative, attacked Pizza Rat personally while crediting NYC Mayor Eric Adams.
“Pizza Rat will find no quarter in city parks soon enough, thanks to these pizza-ready trash cans,” Joshi said. “This is yet another creative way the Adams administration is improving quality of life for people, not pests.”
