accessibility assessment

a geog 471 project

Since 2004, UBC Waste Management has brought organic waste from campus to an in-vessel composting facility on south campus for processing. The composting program at UBC is a closed-loop system, meaning that it is run by UBC, for UBC. Organic waste is collected in green “organics” bins around campus and brought to the composting facility by Waste Management. The final product, high quality compost, is then used by UBC Plant Operations for landscaping purposes on campus. To date, more than 5,000 green bins of organic waste has been diverted from landfills through the program.

For this project, we aimed to analyze the spatial distribution of organics bins on campus, in some cases in relation to food outlets. The purpose of inquiry was twofold. We aimed to  create a GIS with organics bin locations that would  be available for future use. We wanted to create a hard-copy map from this data to be posted around campus for educational purposes. Second, through a series of distinct analyses we aimed to  identify optimal locations for additional bin placement, to serve as a tool for UBC Waste Management.