War on rats gets ugly as hundreds of ‘eyesore' Empire Bins gobble up parking spaces in Harlem

New York Post

04-06-2025

These drivers are in for rat-ical change.
West Harlem has become the first neighborhood in the United States to have all of its trash containerized in order to squash uptown rats' curbside trash feasts, City Hall officials said Monday – but the hundreds of UFO-like 'Empire Bins' are now permanently taking some coveted parking spots, The Post has learned.
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4 West Harlem has become the first neighborhood in the United States to have all of its trash containerized in an attempt to squash uptown rats' curbside trash feasts.
Gregory P. Mango
The latest cohort of European-style bins, which are mandatory for all residential properties with more than 30 units, were installed over the weekend — and have gobbled up about 4% of parking spaces in the neighborhood overnight, a city sanitation department rep told The Post.
'It takes up parking spots that were already hard to find,' said Harlem resident Erica Lamont, who claims she circled the blocks of Broadway and West 149th Street for a half-hour on Tuesday morning.
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'The bins are the size of small cars and when you put two and three on a residential street, you are ultimately forcing people to force blocks away,' Lamont, 46, said.
'It's not placed in no standing or truck loading zones – they are placed in the few actual parking spots that residents could get,' said Michelle R., a 40-year-old dog sitter in the neighborhood. 'I like the garbage cans, but I feel bad for the people that normally park their cars there.'
Other locals, like Harlem resident David Jones, simply blasted the bizarre look of the gargantuan containers.
'It's an eyesore,' said Jones, 40. 'It's right there in front of your face. I'm neutral. If it does the job then let's applaud it — If it doesn't, then let's get rid of them and come up with something else.'
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4 The latest cohort of European-style bins, which are mandatory for all residential properties with more than 30 units, were installed over the weekend, the city said.
Gregory P. Mango
Some locals previously told The Post the massive receptacles clash with the neighborhood's aesthetic, even though they may be needed to scare away rats.
The pilot program, which spans Manhattan's Community Board 9, includes 1,100 on-street containers for about 29,000 residents living in properties with over 30 units, as well as about half of properties with 10 to 30 units that opted to use the bins.
The locked bins are accessible to building staff and waste managers via 'access cards,' and have been serviced by automated side-loading trucks since Monday.
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'Rat sightings in NYC are down six months in a row,' a DSNY rep told The Post. 'This is the exact same period that residential bin requirements have been in effect. Containerization WORKS, and there is no reason that other cities can have it and New York can't.'
4 The pilot program, which spans Manhattan's Community Board 9, includes 1,100 on-street containers for about 29,000 residents.
Gregory P. Mango
But while citywide rat sightings are down, Manhattan's Community Board 9 has seen a 7.8% jump in rat sightings compared to this time last year, according to a Post analysis of 311 data.
Still, City Hall hopes the new bins will end the curbside rat buffet fueled by garbage bags lingering on residential streets — which uptown residents say have made it nearly impossible to walk on some streets at night.
'When there's trash on the sidewalk, there's rats—plain and simple. And yet for years, City Hall acted like trash cans were some sort of sci-fi/fantasy invention,' said Council Member Shaun Abreu, Chair of the Committee on Sanitation and Solid Waste Management.
'Now with full containerization in West Harlem and Morningside Heights, we've got clean bins, no more sidewalk piles, and fewer rats. We fought like hell to make this happen, and now we're proving it works.'
Harlem resident Rick M. said he hopes the new containers are effective as residents have historically had to move quickly past piles of street side trash 'because you don't know what may run out.
'I've seen rats run from one big pile to another so it's nice to not have to walk by piles of trash,' the 30-year-old said.
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4 Harlem resident Wise Grant, 64, warns the containers are only as effective as those who use them.
Steven Vago/NY Post
'The rat problem was so bad here that humans couldn't be living here — they'd be attacking you right here,' lifelong Harlem resident Shanice Day told The Post at Morningside Avenue and 124th Street.
Day, 39, recalls rats as big as cats 'like Master Splinter rats from Ninja Turtles' that would chew wires off people's cars — and attributes the Empire Bins to a rapid decrease in rodent sightings.
'What I can honestly say is we are almost rat free,' she added. 'If people are upset about the bins they're crazy, because they are a big help.'
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But Harlem resident Wise Grant, 64, warns the containers are only as effective as those who use them.
'It slows them down but it's not a way to get rid of them,' the retired voting machine technician said. 'It's up to the individual people. People throw food on the floor and it feeds them.'
'That's what people do on the streets. They don't care … They have to care about where they live.'