BY LISA DONOVAN
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Cincinnati City Council will begin discussions this week about whether to build a garbage transfer center, with the aim of improving curbside pickup and saving the city up to $400,000.
As with cell towers and jails, a transfer station may be necessary but most residents don't want one nearby. Nonetheless, the city is studying whether a more efficient method could exist for hauling garbage now that the ELDA dump in Winton Hills is closed. Garbage crews now take their loads to the Rumpke landfill in Colerain Township. With a centrally located transfer station -- usually an enclosed garbage warehouse of sorts -- trash can be taken to that single location and then shipped, en masse, to a landfill.
"The point is to keep your trucks doing what they do best: picking up garbage in front of your house instead of spending time driving long distances to a landfill," said Karl Graham, solid-waste coordinator in the city's Office of Environmental Management. Councilman Todd Portune, chairman of the city's Public Works Committee that will initially tackle the issue, envisions more efficient curbside pickup. He said he wants to study whether separate pickups -- for recycling, yard waste and solid waste -- could be consolidated. "One of the things that could potentially happen with a transfer station is that a you have one truck going through a neighborhood; and at the source site, the waste is separated," Mr. Portune said. The city administration is endorsing the transfer station method; and now it is up to the council to review that recommendation, along with a consultant's report on the merits of such a facility. Consultant R.W. Beck Inc. and city officials have has concluded that a transfer station could be operated most inexpensively with a partner -- either a business or another political jurisdiction. "Instead of bearing the entire cost, the city with a partner could share the cost of investing in a transfer station," Mr. Graham said.
That savings could add up to $400,000 annually, he said. The cost of building such a facility ranges between $1 million and $2 million.
Officials note that analysis shows the cost of direct hauling and of "transfer hauling" to the Rumpke landfill are comparable, but the city is examining long-term solutions -- anticipating that solid waste would have to be taken to more remote locations as dumps reach capacity.
In an Aug. 5 report detailing Cincinnati's need for a transfer station, the city's director of environmental management, Dennis Murphey, wrote: "There are significant benefits which can be obtained through the use of transfer hauling as disposal sites become more distant, and to stimulate price competition among landfill disposal companies."
The transfer station is one of the more important components of the comprehensive solid-waste management plan on which officials and residents are working.
For now, council will simply have to decide whether to move ahead with a transfer station concept.
If it chooses that concept, discussion would begin about where to build such a site. Only a few concentrated sections of the city are zoned appropriately for such a facility, including some industrial stretches on the west side along Interstate 75 and a pocket on the east side in the Wooster Pike-Columbia Parkway area.
A key component is making sure that "environmental justice" is taken into account, Mr. Graham said, explaining the concern about the concentration of such facilities in areas where the poor or minorities live.
"We're sensitive to that -- we don't want to be in a position where we're shoving a facility down someone's throat," Mr. Graham said. That's why, if council decides to move ahead with plans to build such a facility, a citizens "siting" group should be formed to help choose a location, he said.
Discussion of the transfer station and the consultant's report will be 2 p.m. today during the city's Public Works Committee meeting. The meeting will beheld in council chambers on the third floor of city hall, 801 Plum St.
