Braille to help visually-impaired Calgarians with recycling

Blue means recycling and black means garbage for Calgarians, but those coloured bins don’t work for people who are visually-impaired.

The City of Calgary aims to change that with a new program using braille and large, raised letters.

Plaques with “G” for garbage and “R” for recycling are now optional additions for the lids of carts.

The letters are in high contrast colours to help those with limited vision; they can also include raised dots for those who read braille.

“Before I received my plaques, I would have to remember what the shape and lids of each of my carts looked like,” said Kelly Nadeau, who is legally blind and one of the first Calgarians using the system.

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "Before I received my plaques, I would have to remember what the shape and lids of each of my carts looked like," said Kelly Nadeau, who is legally blind and one of the first Calgarians using the system.

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The program is a joint initiative between Waste & Recycling Services and Community & Neighbourhood Services.

“We want to help residents get the right material into the right cart – recycling into blue and garbage into the black,” said Philippa Wagner, Waste & Recycling Services program coordinator.

There is no charge for the city to install these plaques.

They can be requested by calling 311.