I've been wondering when the curbside recycling program would be restarted. The answer is "soon, we hope".

Eco-minded residents who normally place plastics, newspapers and other items at the curb for recycling will have to continue to visit city drop-off sites or H-E-B grocery stores while city-contracted crews focus on removing vast amounts of Hurricane Ike debris. It is unclear when the city's curbside program, which serves about 160,000 households, will resume.

The city suspended its curbside recycling program after Ike made landfall last month so that every available truck could be devoted to debris removal.

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[Mayor Bill] White has pledged to reduce the amount of trash Houston sends to landfills by 20 percent in the next 18 months.

Now, that objective and the city's plan to improve its recycling program are both stalled.

"We're just temporarily sidetracked by this major storm," said Frank Michel, the mayor's spokesman.

City officials hope crews, including those normally assigned to the recycling program, will have made a pass to pick up debris along all city streets by Oct. 18.

Additional passes to pick up the remaining materials will continue in the coming months.

"Our primary goal is on getting rid of storm debris," Department of Solid Waste Management spokeswoman Marina Joseph said. "We are making good progress with storm debris pickup. We want everything to get back to normal."