Automated garbage collection will roll out for about one-third of St. John’s by June 11 and officials gathered Friday at the Robin Hood Bay Regional Waste Management Facility to explain how it will work.
Ward 4 Coun. Ian Froude, council’s lead for public works, and staff from the city’s waste management division were in the parking lot of the Robin Hood Bay recycling facility on a brisk, windy Friday morning to talk about Phase 1 of the automated garbage collection program.
Froude said the new system will reduce exhaustion for workers, who previously had to get in and out of trucks and lift multiple, often heavy garbage bags. It will also lessen the likelihood of workers being cut from garbage bags containing broken glass, for example.
“It would make it a lot safer, too, for the operators, a lot less injuries,” said an operator at the landfill.
“There have been some issues, people not wrapping up glass properly.”
Workers don’t have to get out of the garbage truck with the new system. They operate the truck’s mechanical arm — which can extend up to nine feet — to pick up the garbage carts located at the curb. The arm the cart and dumps its contents into the truck.
The cart is a black rectangular bin with rubber wheels and handles.
The cart must be placed on a property three feet from the sidewalk, and there are arrows showing the direction it must face. Otherwise, the container pickup won’t work and the arm might accidentally knock over the cart if the container is not positioned properly.
The carts are resistant to winds of up to 65 km/h, but can be blown over by stronger winds, even though they are weighted at the bottom.
“The bins are designed in a way so if they do tip over they will not go very far because they have large flat sides,” Froude said. “They are not round like most bins … so they won’t roll down the street.”
According to St. John’s Waste and Recycling, the carts can hold up to four regular bags of garbage, while carts in nearby Paradise can hold up to six full garbage bags.
Froude said during the public engagement process, two-thirds of residents indicated they would prefer a medium-size cart to reduce the amount of garbage in the landfill.
The carts will address the problem of garbage bags being torn open by animals and birds, despite the use of protective nets.
Every participating house and apartment has been given a free cart that is electronically tagged, because the cart belongs to the address and not the occupant. The trucks have tracking systems to identify the location of any bin lost or stolen, and workers will bring it back to the appropriate property, Froude noted.
