Rome triples the number of bins on city streets.

Rome has started the process of installing 18,000 new rubbish bins, tripling the total number on streets around the capital, in time for the Vatican's Jubilee Year 2025.

The first new-look bins were installed on Tuesday along Via dei Fori Imperiali, the thoroughfare between the Colosseum and Piazza Venezia, in the centre of Rome.

The bins were unveiled with much fanfare by the city's mayor Roberto Gualtieri who hailed them as "more beautiful, sustainable and capacious".

The new bin even has its own name - Cestò - a play on the Italian word "cesto" for bin and "Ce sto!", meaning "I'm in" in Roman dialect.

Oggi abbiamo inaugurato Cestò, il nuovo cestino di Roma Capitale, uguale in tutta la città. Ne installeremo da qui a dicembre 18mila, triplicandone il numero attuale, dal centro alla periferia.
Sono cestini più belli, sostenibili e capienti. Provvederemo alla differenziazione a… pic.twitter.com/WXJcN1wqZA

— Roberto Gualtieri (@gualtierieurope) June 25, 2024

The new bins - the latest in a series introduced in recent years - are designed to look like the older cast-iron cestoni unveiled during Jubilee Year 2000.

In a statement, the city said the new model is safe because it is made of fireproof and explosion-proof material, and sustainable because it is made of recycled plastic and is recyclable.

The new bin will replace the four existing bin models, many of which have seen better days, in what Gualtieri says "will bring uniformity" to the streets of the capital.

Currently there are at least four different types of rubbish bins on the streets of the city centre. This summer the city will begin to install new bins, made of recycled plastic, tripling the current number of street bins from 6,000 to more than 18,000. https://t.co/ME6ZyzmDup pic.twitter.com/btppVfrzJH

— Wanted in Rome (@wantedinrome) March 26, 2024

The city also says the thousands of extra bins will make it possible to increase rubbish collection by 70 per cent in busy areas including around St Peter's, the Colosseum and Piazza Venezia.

The last time new street bins were introduced, more than three years ago under former mayor Virginia Raggi, they were compared by Romans to funeral urns.

The amphora-shaped bins were brought in to replace the hanging bag variety which in turn was introduced several years earlier as part of anti-terrorism measures.

Apart from blowing in the wind, the main problem with the exposed bin bags was that seagulls pecked at them until the trash spilled onto the ground.

Earlier this year the city rolled out dozens of new "smart bins" equipped with an intelligent system that provides data relating to the amount of waste inside the bin and the type of rubbish it receives.

Photo Roma Capitale