Workers Sorting Recycling at a Depot

An overhead recycling depot spreads across green-lined walkways, each lane leading to a different sorting task. Workers in yellow and orange vests pick bottles and cans from conveyor belts behind clear dividers, dropping them into color-coded bins, while others bundle newspapers into stacks or feed cardboard through a baling press. A crane with a claw and a magnet lifts a wrecked engine from a scrap bin, and nearby a worker swings a handheld magnet to gather stray nails. Bottle caps lie swept into a rainbow pile, a rusty barrel holds a garden gnome, and a bird has built its nest from scrap wire. Stray cats nap in a cardboard box and on a stack of newspaper, and near the shredder a heap of pastel stuffed toys waits its turn. Every lane and bin already sorts itself by color and kind, ready to be pieced back into whole loads.