BALTIMORE, Md. — Trash haulers line up for hours on Reisterstown Road to dump their loads where the main problem at the Northwest Transfer Station is getting to the dumpster to make that transfer.
“Sometimes we are up here for two, maybe three hours, and I have seen people actually pull out of these lines,” said Kevin Herrington, who makes his living hauling discarded furniture and materials, “Now, where do you think their trash is going? Going back into the neighborhoods that they took it out of, in the back alleys, in the yards, you know, it’s frustrating.”
Residents rely upon the site just like those who haul trash for a living.
“It’s always the same and slow,” said Angela Cheeks of Northwest Baltimore, “I’ve been here like three times probably in the last three years, and it’s always been a big chunk of my life.”
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First, they blamed the long lines on the pandemic.
Then, they wanted to say it was the multi-million dollar improvements going on at the waste-to-energy incinerator in Westport pushing more traffic here, but haulers we spoke with say this has been going on for years.
City Councilman Isaac “Yitzy” Schleifer has been appealing to the public works department for years to do something about it.
Last year, he said, it finally brought in larger dumpsters, but he says it’s time to bring in more workers to switch them out more quickly when they get full.
“What DPW can do is have additional drivers here so they can move out the two dumpsters that they’re dumping into all at once and put two in instantly, so instead of taking 15 minutes every hour, it would take 5 minutes every hour,” said Schleifer.
Schleifer also has suggested that DPW run two lanes of vehicles into the facility with people unloading from both sides of the dumpsters, but he was told that would cost money.
He said they have the money, with a much bigger budget than even the police department.
“We try to make all of this work and make Baltimore City a better and cleaner place,” said Mark Willis, as he sat waiting to unload, “but this system has got to be worked out better.”
WMAR-2 tried to reach public works for comment, to no avail, and Councilman Schleifer says they don’t return his calls either.
