FAIRHOPE — The City of Fairhope is partnering with the Osprey Initiative to collect recyclable glass products to be turned into concrete for Flying Creek Nature Preserve and is accepting glass until Oct 4.
"This is the first time that we've done anything like this in Fairhope," said Nicole Love, grants coordinator for the city.
Residents who have a city dump sticker can go to the landfill to drop off glass at the recycling area. For those who do not have a sticker, there will be collections held at the Fairhope Farmers Market on Sept 19 and 26.
"We just had a really unique opportunity with the Flying Creek Nature Preserve," Love said.
Love works with environmental roles frequently and before working for the city worked with Tompson Engineering, which is a part of the design team for the developing area. Love said everyone working on Flying Creek lives in Fairhope.
Flying Creek was started with the use of a GoMESA grant to transform the 72-acre northern part of what was called the Triangle property, Love said. She started working on this project before she started working for the city.
Don Bates, founder of the Osprey Initiative, said a lot of testing has been done with the type of concrete that will be made from the recycled glass.
"We just made our conference room walls out of concrete made from crushed glass," Bates said. "The spirit of these projects are happening."
Bates mentioned other materials used in concrete and how they've been testing using recycled Styrofoam. A group out of New Jersey that he is working with is building a model using waste plastics in concrete.
"Fairhope is the perfect city to try something," Bates said. "There's just an expectation in Fairhope. I think sometimes it's tough, but their citizens hold everyone accountable."
Bates said the glass will be crushed at the recycling facility Glass Half Full, which is based in New Orleans. Once that glass is crushed, it will be mixed with Portland cement on-site to make the paved walking trails.
Flying Creek will also have educational signage about the process of recycling the glass. Love said the area's construction is going to use low-impact development.
"Just so that we're making sure we are protecting nature while we're also giving people an opportunity to be in nature," Love said. "It just seemed like such a logical step."
Love said this will also allow people to become informed on things they can do (or avoid) to help the environment, specifically with recycling. She said she thinks this is a "very holistic" way to use this property.
Bates agreed, stating this property will not be used for the "short-term successes of today" but will become an investment for years to come. He was appreciative of Mayor Sherry Sullivan, city council and the community for supporting a project like this.
"We've protected a green space in a place that everyone wants to put up a house," Bates said, talking about the desirable location of the property.
Fairhope recycling does accept glass, but it is not usually recycled into other objects locally. Typically, it is repurposed into new glass bottles if recycled. With this project, the glass does not have to go through as strict of a cleaning and sorting process like there is in the single-stream recycling.
Love said she would like to "give a big thanks" to the Grand Hotel, Bone and Barrel and My Place, which have partnered with the City of Fairhope to recycle the glass that they toss out. She said she'd love to see how much they would be able to collect from local restaurants.
"You know, the restaurants are big glass users, so this was huge to get them on board," Love said.
Bates said Baldwin County, as well as Mobile County, have had "the right energy" to get this type of recycling project started. He is excited to see where recycling in the area is headed, referencing Novelis' plant that us under construction in Bay Minette, and hopes to see a glass recycling company closer to the area soon.
