PublicLabs in Cali
The transportation alternatives in Cali are divided into public (collective and individual) and private. To address the shortcomings of public transport, in 2006, the city began the implementation of a Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) system that is still under development and is currently complemented by conventional buses that still persist. Regarding the modal partition, bus systems (BRT and conventional buses) serve around 18% of trips, while individual public transport (taxi) serves approximately 6%. The private alternatives of an individual nature (cars and motorcycles) serve 13% and 18% of the trips respectively. Among the sustainable options, the bicycle is used for a fraction of approximately 5%, while trips on foot are the most representative in the modal partition, with 32% (see graph below), which indicates that a large percentage of trips are made between origins and destinations suitable for walking.
Research on mobility in Cali shows the dissatisfaction of users with the means of public transport available. This has generated the growth of the number of cars and motorcycles, which do not contribute to the consolidation of sustainable mobility in the city. In this context, it is necessary to reduce the existing gaps between the investment in transport modes and the proportion of trips they mobilize, and promote equity in the supply of transport (operational and spatial), and minimize the disadvantages in terms of accessibility that they appear in some territories of the city.
In 2018, the generation of ordinary solid waste in Cali was around 800,000 tons (see graph below). According to data from the municipality, the city generated 1,900 tons per day, of which only 27 tons (1.4%) were recovered through the recycling chain.
The low rate of reduction and recycling, is forcing a high disposal of bio-waste in the sanitary landfill, which generates negative impacts from the sanitary, environmental and economic points of view. In this city, according to CIAT, DAGMA & CVC (2015), the decomposition of biowaste has become the second source of GHG generation.
The Colomba-El Guabal Sanitary Landfill, located 62 kilometers from Cali in the municipality of Yotoco, received around 2,500 tons per day of solid waste in 2018, from 20 municipalities. Of this amount, Cali contributed 74% of waste, of which the majority was bio-waste (61.4%),
followed by plastic (18.7%) and paper/paperboard (9,8%). What these figures indicate is the urgency of reducing the generation of solid waste through strategies such as Zero Waste and, at the same time, increasing the use of waste through recycling in order to cut down the number of tons that are sent to the landfill.
