New recycling/trash schedule, week 2: Everything OK for you?

| Utilities | West Seattle news

Seattle Public Utilities says its first week and a half of recycling, yard/food waste, and trash pickup changes has gone relatively smoothly, with a half-percent miss rate for home customers and five percent for apartment/condo/commercial customers. It’s expanded the call-center hours so that if you’re missed or have some other problem, you can reach someone at 684-3000 7:30 am-7 pm weekdays, 9 am-1 pm Saturdays. SPU also says it has “inspectors” trailing crews to check for trouble. (Photo by Christopher Boffoli)

RobertSeattle April 9, 2009 (2:14 pm)

We had some weirdness on 37th Ave SW / Lander blocks on Monday where the clean green truck ONLY picked up the big clean green containers and did not even touch the new small ones or extra clean green cans.

nudibranch April 9, 2009 (2:27 pm)

My recycling didn’t get picked up until after 5 p.m. so that was sort of weird. And this is in Alki, so having garbage trucks driving around this last Monday afternoon made traffic a little more interesting.

comment by me April 9, 2009 (2:39 pm)

Mine has been great. However, I noticed that a couple of my neighbors on my street put out recycling bins this week, even though it wasn’t scheduled for this week.
I think that the graphical calendar might have confused some people with the last couple of days of March shown on the April calendar.

Forest April 9, 2009 (2:50 pm)

Were customers supposed to have already received the updated trash and recycling containers? I’ve yet to receive or note any updated containers in the general vicinity between the W.S. Junction and Admiral.

Wally April 9, 2009 (2:51 pm)

Since the bottles can now go into the big green recycling can. What do we do with the smaller glass recycle bins?

Donuts for all April 9, 2009 (3:03 pm)

The recycling was completely skipped for my entire block 2 days in a row.

Food in the yard waste stinks. Would be helpful if they provided proper containers that had more of a locking lids to keep the critters out.

Wally – the notice indicated that they would pick up the glass recycle bins if you left them out (but they haven’t even picked up my recycling so I’m not sure to trust this notice yet.)

comment by me April 9, 2009 (3:12 pm)

Double check your calendar for the correct recycling week for your street.
As I mentioned above, several of my neighbors incorrectly thought this week was recycling. It was not!

Derek April 9, 2009 (3:12 pm)

As of this morning when I left for work Recycling had not yet been picked up yet in the area around High Point. At least not in our condos block.

squareeyes April 9, 2009 (3:15 pm)

I left my glass bin out, upside down as instructed on recycle day so they’d pick it up. They emptied my recycle bin but left the glass bin where I left it. They also left my neighbor’s new garbage box on my lawn, thankfully they had written the address on it so I knew where to take it. They emptied her recycling bin, but left the glass bin chock-full of bottles next to it. …a few teething pains…

hoppeduponthebean April 9, 2009 (3:23 pm)

My recycling hasn’t been picked up for 2 weeks…what the heck is going on?

Dave April 9, 2009 (3:24 pm)

Same thing with our glass bin, squareeyes – we were told to put it out, updside down, and it would be picked up. It’s still there …

DownTheStreet April 9, 2009 (3:30 pm)

We got skipped for recycling this week (Tuesday) – Monroe off Fauntleroy. And, yes, I double checked the calendar – both online and print version. I submitted a notification on the SPU website.

Bonnie April 9, 2009 (3:42 pm)

No problems here.

snakehillneighbor April 9, 2009 (3:51 pm)

We haven’t received our new sized trash container yet.

Deb April 9, 2009 (3:56 pm)

I did not know that they had changed my recycling cycle since I am a renter and the landlord pays the utilities…a note on the container would have been nice so that I would not have put my container out this week…

Sue April 9, 2009 (4:04 pm)

I called about the new food waste containers, and they said they were very backlogged and hoped to have containers to everyone who ordered them (or changed service) by the end of April.
.
As for people confusing what was picked up, when the day of the week changed for us, some people apparently had their weeks switched along with the day of the week. We always had Monday pickup, and the week of 3/30 (according to the old schedule) was a recycling week. But when they switched us to Tuesday, the 3/30 week suddenly became a yard waste week, which means recycling skipped another week, and when it was picked up on 4/7 it had been out for 3 weeks. If you hadn’t read the calendar and just went by what you always did, it was easy to miss and get confused.
.
We did get everything picked up this week, but I’m not used to having things picked up so late in the day. We used to have Monday pickup around 7-7:30am for everything. This week they came in the morning for gargage and yard waste, but didn’t come for recycling until almost 6pm. I was ready to call it in as missed, and then they showed up. Not a problem if it’s late – I mean, somebody’s got to be last in the day – I’m just glad they showed up!

CB April 9, 2009 (4:07 pm)

Our garbage still has not been picked up… called the number to arrange a missed collection. Still no service.

I miss the old system.

AEL April 9, 2009 (4:19 pm)

Same problem with the old containers for me. They picked up the recycle, but left the upside down glass container. I left the upside down container on curb until I know what to do with it. Very annoying since I hate to see trash on the curb.

Thermo April 9, 2009 (4:52 pm)

I live on hemlock and 45th and the whole block was missed for recycling. It was supposed to be Tuesday, and everyone’s receptacles are still sitting out. As of noon today, still full. I verified the pick up dates on the http://www.ci.seattle.wa.us/util/services/ website.

ken April 9, 2009 (4:55 pm)

The recycling around Lincoln Park was not picked up on Tuesday. I called this morning and the lady was suprised that no one on the whole street had called after two days. We also are on our third week without pickup due to the schedule change. The lady also confirmed that the pickup day was April 7 and said that the recycling should be picked up by Friday. I feel like this is “Mayor Nickel’s Green Storm” and we should get another whopping $5.00 rebate. I hope this is not an indication that the Sanitary Engineers are overwhelmed with the Mayor’s directives.

Henchbot April 9, 2009 (6:27 pm)

new system is a joke. Thanks Mayor Pickles, youve done it again. Every day on Alki I see entire crews….multi crews even…of city henchman running around clogging local alleys with freshly minted trucks. Well not minted…just painted. Who is paying for that labor I wonder. Suuuurely not us.
Our trash was so bad this week it was spilling out or TWO dumpters which in turn fed the feral raccoon populace which in turn led them to dumping all over the area. This afternoon coming into my lot I had to stop and literally move the dumpster from out of the road and into its assigned spot. These guys are lame.
Dont even ask me about the alleys/homeless strongholds downtown. Its a major problem, still.

MellyMel April 9, 2009 (10:54 pm)

My only comment is that the new crew seems to have a protocol of honking the horn once or twice when emerging from the alley onto the street. Saftey thing? I dunno, but they did it for all four alleys near me — at 7:30 am it wrecked my sleeping in which is the only nice part of being laid off .

Mariah April 10, 2009 (12:48 am)

Everything good here…the neighbor across the alley though is quite confused. He kept on talking about his recycling being full. He missed his first pickup on the new schedule. I’m sure this will all work out in the wash.:)

Martin Napier April 10, 2009 (7:10 am)

I have to admit the level of middle managing the city has done in regards to recycling has been sub-par. Last week we were scheduled the day after the transition (31st or March). Rather than pick up recycling, compost, and regular trash; they elected to only pick up the two latter. In the end I feel they should have considered customers that had already been waiting two weeks for recycling and dispatched a truck when asked upon to do so.
This week they picked all of it up (natch’) and my email to Cleanscapes and the city sanitation director / staff, have gone unanswered. I guess who I won’t be voting for come election time and yes I know its a knee jerk reaction to my situation, but its my feelings right now, till something is corrected.

Donuts for all April 10, 2009 (7:23 am)

ME – I did check my printed schedule multiple times – and I’m pretty sure the whole street did do. Funny – the lady I called to report the missed pickups confirmed they should have happened also. Now I’m stuck with a completely full recycle container for the rest of the next 2 weeks.

Maybe you shouldn’t assume I’m stupid and can’t read the schedule properly.

I laugh at the statistic of 0.5% errors. Love the new math.

WSB April 10, 2009 (7:51 am)

Donuts- the person who answered the city hotline said they could NOT send someone out to remedy the missed pickup?

austin April 10, 2009 (7:57 am)

Recycling, trash and the little food waste container were all picked up at my house without issue on monday athough recycling was picked up later than I’ve seen in the past. My old glass bin will be home to a tigerella tomato plant this season.

Bogie April 10, 2009 (8:03 am)

Our glass bin was picked up when left upside down this week. However, we are still waiting for new yard waste an garbage bins after calling over a week ago. The customer service on the phone was surprisingly plesant though. I have to give them credit for that :)

TeaLady April 10, 2009 (8:21 am)

39th & Hinds. My garbage bin was not emptied but my neighbor’s bin which sits directly next to mine was. I’m assuming it was an oversight and will hope for the best on Monday!

Under_Achiever April 10, 2009 (8:27 am)

Just got off the phone with the Mayor’s office. His assistant told me there is a ‘computer glitch’ @ the new trash/recycling subcontractor making it difficult/impossible for Seattle Public Utilities to communicate with the contractor. I was told recycling will be picked up but no one at SPU or the Mayor’s office knows when.

Chris M April 10, 2009 (8:37 am)

Everything has been picked up on schedule and when expected in my neighborhood.

I actually was impressed by the multiple communication methods that were done leading up to the service change.

I also trust that after the new/retrained crews have had a chance to run the routes more than once or twice things will gel more — new turf is tough for any driver or service provider.

What I have noticed immediately is that my trash can isn’t nearly as packed as it has been in the past… to think of that times the number of residents in Seattle, it’s a lot of waste tons going into a compost pile and not a landfill. Along with simplified recycling, I’m a happy customer.

Donuts for all April 10, 2009 (9:55 am)

WSB – hotline at 6:15pm on Tuesday said they would try to pick up but give them up to 2 days and then if it didn’t picked up by then hold it for the 2 weeks “It would be ok to put out extra.” It is now Friday and no sign of anyone picking up on my street.

Trick is if my large bin is already full how the heck am I going to store another 2 weeks worth? And I just don’t trust the new system not to charge me extra for the double load at this point.

MB April 10, 2009 (12:39 pm)

After some confusion last week, everything was picked up with no problems this week. I would like to say though that I find it annoying that I didn’t receive any notification on my can of a day change in Highland Park, nor did my mom just off of Delridge, yet she is a Nanny in the Mt. Baker neighborhood (near the lake, fancier than us) and they had entire teams in reflective vests out notifying people. What’s up with that?

Mike April 10, 2009 (3:56 pm)

Is it true that Mayor Nickels is part owner of the new trash pick-up company?

WSB April 10, 2009 (4:05 pm)

Which one? Two companies have city contracts now – CleanScapes and Waste Management.

DLP April 11, 2009 (9:51 am)

Still waiting for our new, smaller garbage can.

SDW April 14, 2009 (1:02 pm)

I live just up the hill from Lincoln Park, off of Rose. I have called three times since they were supposed to pick up last Tuesday and they have still missed our entire block.