There is a way to get rid of the mountains of trash and garbage, it is cost-efficient, and it is also able to make New York City nearly self-reliant in electrical energy.
Plasma arc waste reduction systems already exist, and are up and running on a commercial basis in a number of locations already.
https://www.explainthatstuff.com/plasma-arc-recycling.html
This system uses a large initial input of electrical energy to get the cycle started, but once up and running, it can digest virtually anything short of radioactive waste. As it operates, it generates large quantities of syngas (hydrogen and carbon monoxide), which may be used directly to generate power through gas turbines that drive power generators, producing more power that necessary to sustain the arc, once initiated, This excess power is then available to feed back into the power grid, plus all the other materials that are fed into the system, as finely granulated material made of the waste stream, are either gasified and burned along with the syngas, or fall to the bottom of the retort as a molten slag, with all the metallic components in the trash. This slag is drained off, much like the slag from an iron foundry, and is either put to the side, as a potential building material (it has a major amount of silica as its primary non-metallic composition), or it is a relatively high-grade ore for a number of other metallic elements, as there was also much electronic equipment, old refrigerators, used hardware, and general junk like radial tires and old glass bottles. Hazardous biowaste is also consumed by using this method.
The ultimate recycling system.
Great, now China can lie about how green their cheap steel is as well as lying about how strong it is...:^)