Kickstart: Plastics in public places

Single-use plastics are continuing to be the target of environmental pushes at sites ranging from national parks to local neighborhood entertainment zones.

On the federal level, three environmental groups are encouraging leaders of the National Park Service to move faster to cut back on single-use water bottles at parks.

Currently, President Joe Biden's administration has set a target to phase out many single-use plastics by 2032 at the parks, but as PN's Bridget Janis writes, the groups want to see that change within two years, not 10.

On the local level, residents in Charlotte, N.C., are asking city leaders to ban single-use plastics in "social district" zones under consideration. The zones allow bars and restaurants to serve alcohol outside their buildings in specific areas and have been embraced in other North Carolina communities. During a hearing this week, some Charlotte residents brought up their concerns not just with noise or overconsumption of alcohol, but whether excess litter from those zones could end up in nearby waterways. Rejecting any single-use plastics from those sites should help, the residents said.

"Our prosperous and forward-thinking city should be in the forefront of banning, not encouraging, the use of single-use disposable plastic cups," said Nancy Pierce, a resident in one neighborhood targeted for a district, Genna Contino of The Charlotte Observer reported.

A New York-based eyewear startup wants to take on global giant Luxottica.

No, not Warby Parker. Pair Eyewear launched in 2019 with a twist on traditional glasses. Rather than buying one or two pairs, then wearing that same look for a year or two, Pair sells a base frame, which is then matched with a selection of different acetate "Top Frames" that pop on top of the base to give a whole new look to the existing glasses. At $25 per Top Frame, Pair's founders told our sister paper Crain's New York Business that a typical customer buys five Top Frames to rotate between at any time.

Pair has its own manufacturing facility in Irvine, Calif., allowing it to produce on demand for its customers. It also has licensing agreements that allow it to offer not only a variety of colors and patterns, but also designs featuring superheroes, major league sports teams, Coca-Cola Co. patterns and even frames featuring Hogwarts houses from the Harry Potter series of books.

Materials company Ineos may have missed its shot at buying English Premier League soccer team Chelsea FC earlier this year, but Ineos' owner Jim Ratcliffe is out to buy a piece of competitor Manchester United.

The team has won the English championship 20 times but currently sits near the bottom of the standings. Its controlling owners — the family of U.S. financier Malcolm Glazer, who died in 2014 — may be open to selling a minority share, the BBC reported, and Ratcliffe is interested, a spokesman has told anyone who asks. Even if, as The New York Times pointed out, no one at the team or the Glazer family has actually announced that it's for sale.

Ratcliffe was a boyhood fan of the club. He also owns soccer teams in France and Switzerland and the Ineos Grenadiers professional cycling team. Ineos also has a partnership with a Mercedes F1 team.