09/18/2026
♻️ Could Hamilton Turn Our Recycled Plastic into Park Benches and Muskoka Chairs?
Canadians carefully sort their recycling, but collecting plastic does not necessarily mean it becomes another useful product. Statistics Canada reports that Canadians discarded approximately 5.15 million tonnes of plastic in 2022, while only 333,000 tonnes were converted by Canadian recyclers into pellets, flakes and fibres for manufacturing. That is roughly 6.5% of the plastic discarded.
Here in Hamilton, the City manages more than 200,000 tonnes of waste each year. Its new Solid Waste Management Master Plan says approximately 60% of what residents currently put in the garbage could be diverted through existing programs. Glanbrook is now Hamilton’s only active landfill, so extending its remaining life should concern all of us.
What if we helped create an actual local market for our recovered plastic?
Ontario companies are already manufacturing Muskoka chairs, picnic tables, park benches, planters and plastic lumber from recycled HDPE—the material used in milk jugs and detergent bottles.
Hamilton could establish a pilot project that:
♻️ Separates a clean, traceable stream of locally collected HDPE plastic.
🏭 Partners with a Canadian processor to wash and convert it into flakes, pellets or plastic lumber.
🪑 Uses that material to manufacture benches, picnic tables, planters, recycling stations, bollards and other products needed by the City.
🇨🇦 Creates Canadian manufacturing and recycling jobs.
🔄 Requires the products to be taken back and recycled again at the end of their useful lives.
The City could use its purchasing power to create a dependable market by requiring recycled content, Canadian processing, long warranties, repairable parts and end-of-life take-back provisions when it buys municipal furniture.
Imagine sitting on a bench in an Ancaster park with a sign that says:
Made in Ontario from plastic recovered in the Hamilton community.”
Ontario’s Blue Box system is now operated through producer responsibility, so Hamilton would need to bring together recycling operators, producers, manufacturers and municipal procurement staff. But that is exactly the kind of leadership a circular economy requires.
This election season ask City Council to ask staff:
* Where do Hamilton’s different grades of plastic currently go?
* How much actually becomes a new product?
* How much is processed in Ontario or elsewhere in Canada?
* Could Hamilton launch a locally traceable plastics-to-products pilot?
* Could recycled-content requirements be included when the City purchases park furniture and other products?
Hamilton’s waste plan talks about creating a circular economy. Let’s make that commitment something residents can actually see, use and measure.
Would you support turning our locally recovered plastic into locally manufactured park benches, picnic tables and outdoor furniture?
https://www.hamilton.ca/city-council/plans-strategies/master-plans-studies/solid-waste-management-master-plan?utm_source=chatgpt.com
Sources: Statistics Canada, *Plastics in Canada: From Production to Recycling, 2022*; City of Hamilton, *2026–2050 Solid Waste Management Master Plan*.
