New York’s styrofoam ban is back on, effective immeditately

Hide your takeout containers and coffee cups — New York’s ban on styrofoam has been resurrected. In a brief tweet late Friday evening, Mayor Bill de Blasio tweeted that a judge had upheld the ban on single-use styrofoam products championed by former Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

Judging by the excessive enthusiasm of its punctuation, the mayor’s office is excited:

The styrofoam ban was originally passed by the City Council and signed by Bloomberg in December 2013. The bill was set to take effect in January 2016, but a group of advocates led by Dart Container Company who claim polystyrene is recyclable — they even arranged a pilot program — succeeded in getting a judge to overturn it in September 2015.

The city did its own study to test that recycling theory. The results were published in May 2017, concluding that styrofoam “cannot be recycled in a manner that is economically feasible or environmentally effective for New York City.”

One retailer that got ahead of the curve in Dunkin’ Donuts, which eliminated styrofoam cups from its New York City stores on May 1 ahead of a company-wide ban taking effect in 2020.

Let’s just hope the ominous “begin implementation immediately” phrase doesn’t mean you’ll have to bring Tupperware to your favorite food truck on Monday morning.

And New Yorkers already have ideas about what to ban next: