Cities are made up of a group of elements that define their structure, functionality, and the way inhabitants perceive them. In the landscape of Havana, one indicator is gaining increasing prominence: garbage.
On every corner a trash can
Since the 19th century, the corners of Cuban neighborhoods were especially reserved for warehouses, inns, shops, bars, and taverns. After the triumph of the Revolution, this commercial use ceased to align with the principles of socialist urban planning.
Private businesses were intervened and the cultural life of the neighborhood changed, but no one noticed. Some bodegas resisted the transformation process and remain open to this day, but increasingly more pests visit them and fewer customers do.
Yes, many corners of Havana have become nests for rats, mosquitoes, cockroaches, and African snails. The corner has ceased to be an area for economic exchange and has started to turn into that empty space that is the perfect spot to leave trash.
The trees couldn't withstand so much fertilizer
The flowerbeds of Havana that once showcased slender trees now lack this important element in the structuring of the urban landscape. What has happened? Where are the trees so essential to the city?
Trees, as living organisms, become ill, age, and die. This is why major cities around the world have reforestation and urban tree management programs. Havana neglected this work for decades.
The population chopped down every plant that bothered them in the flowerbeds, and in their place, they planted cacti to scare off the kids who play baseball. The few trees that survive are almost always filled with trash, while the neighbors claim, "that's fertilizer."
Fertilization or abandonment?
The cleanliness of Havana has been neglected more than once. The actions of garbage collection and the management of green areas in public spaces were undervalued, leaving a void that was silently filled by trash.
They are picked up time and again, but the mountains of waste continue to grow overnight, in the very place where they should not be. Why? Because that space has lost its purpose in the original urban design; it's an empty void.
The change in the way territory is organized disregarded the work of generations of architects and urban planners who envisioned a different city. Havana came to a standstill in terms of construction, but its population continued to grow and produce waste.
Poor management of state-owned enterprises
The Community Services Company is responsible for managing the garbage collection generated by two million citizens, ensuring the protection of trees, and overseeing the management of public spaces, among many other responsibilities. Working in this sector for decades has been the last resort.
In an interview conducted a few years ago, a former executive confessed to me the challenges of obtaining basic equipment for employees to perform their duties. For instance, it was impossible to acquire work gloves.
They have worked under the constant reduction of the budget without making essential investments, such as purchasing lawn mowers to maintain the grass in green areas, machetes for pruning the trees, or brooms for cleaning. The workers have even had to buy their own tools at certain times.
This is compounded by a limited fleet of garbage trucks and a lack of fuel for waste collection. A total disaster that is evident throughout the city, except in those neighborhoods fortunate enough to have major thoroughfares.
Trash and landscape
Trash is present in one way or another in every landscape of Havana. We have even sold the idyllic image of inhabited ruins and have come to laugh when a tourist poses, delighted, at the gates of a fortress in Old Havana.
There is no grace or poetry in the ruins of the shattered city. Hygiene is a matter that concerns everyone, and without effective state management of garbage collection in Havana, this issue will slowly consume the urban landscape.
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