Trash barrel size

[somerfriend.livejournal.com]

As I read the regulations, city of Somerville limits trash barrels to 32 gallon size.  That's pretty small and if followed would lead to an unsightly multitude of barrels at many multifamilies.   Anecdotally it seems most people have larger barrels.  As long as you keep the barrel not full of anything too heavy, do you think it is acceptable to do a larger barrel?  

Also many barrels come with the bars that would allow the truck to lift them in.  Do the trash pickup tracks have that ability?

Comments

[chenoameg.livejournal.com]

The important limit is the 50 pound limit.

Most of the trucks do not have that ability.

[ceo]

I didn't know about that limit, if I had I might not have gotten one twice that size (identical to the recycling bins, but dark green instead of blue). The garbage trucks do have the lifting things for that type of barrel, but I've never seen them used by either the garbage or recycling collectors; they appear to either toss in a few bags out of the barrel and then dump in the rest, or lean the barrel against the edge of the truck and lift up the bottom. My guess is the barrel lifters are too slow.

[springhill02143.livejournal.com]

I have seen the barrel lifters used in Somerville regularly, but the smaller ones on the back of the truck, not the overhead / automated pick-up ones used in towns with town-issued barrels. They would often use them to lift my neighbor's superheavy multifamily house barrels.

Cambridge has the same 32 gallon barrel limit and did not enforce it for years, but then suddenly started enforcing it, so I'm wary of buying large barrels as the practice could change in Somerville as well and then what will everyone do with those unusable barrels?

[josephineave.livejournal.com]

And then how do you throw away the unusable barrels?

One of life's big questions...

[lac.livejournal.com]

Just as an FYI, I've been using a 50 gallon barrel and I have never had any problems. No one has said boo about it.

[somervillesnow.livejournal.com]

From what I see on Cambridge website their regulation size is a more reasonable 50 gallons.

[springhill02143.livejournal.com]

Hmmmmm, I just remember getting into many debates with the City of Cambridge and its trash contractor about the size of our barrels, and ending up buying a set of 32 gallon ones, only after having to pay many tickets and for a private pick up to deal with the backlog of waste during the period when they wouldn't pick up. It's entirely possible that they changed policy in the five years since or that someone was being a little arbitrary. I don't miss that scene one bit.

[somervillesnow.livejournal.com]

http://www.ci.cambridge.ma.us/theworks/ourservices/recyclingandtrash/aboutrecycling/whatwedo/recyclingandtrashguide.aspx