County bids farewell to junk in style
Ah, the refreshing stink of fresh garbage.
And this trash is guaranteed to be fresh. Snohomish County's newest, state-of-the-art transfer station opened last week in Mountlake Terrace, winning raves from residents and professional garbage haulers alike.
The 18-month, $25 million project replaced an old, cramped facility at 21311 61st Place W. with a massive, high-ceilinged building 10 times its size. Rather than toss household junk into pits, visitors now deposit their unwanted couches, ripped office chairs and broken appliances in the middle of the 35,000-square-foot space, right on the flat concrete floor.
"This is gorgeous," said Julie Wells, 28, as she unloaded a pickup piled with her moving-out clutter — a patched garden hose, a nicked power cord, an old ironing board, a busted Hoover upright, a grungy dog pillow, a broken floor lamp, and odds and ends from her refrigerator.
The Lynnwood woman was happy the Southwest Recycling and Transfer Station had opened in time for her final load. After the old facility closed in March 2003 for construction, she began driving to Kirkland to dispatch her junk. Other South Snohomish County residents survived the long construction period by taking their trash to a temporary transfer station at Cathcart, near Snohomish, now closed.
Under the old system, the residents' use of the facility was restricted to certain hours of the day to allow commercial haulers access.
Now the two groups coexist. As residents unload their clutter, garbage trucks pull into a lane at the building's far end and dump their loads onto a separate patch of floor.
"It's nice. Big," said professional hauler Tim Vos, after he deposited a load from his truck. "Lots of room — I don't have to wait in line. And I like the flat floor a lot — you can just dump it on the ground and drive away."
Facility workers use front-end loaders to shove the trash into two floor chutes, which funnel it to a lower level. Then hydraulic garbage compactors crush it into 15-ton cubes, which are loaded onto containers for shipping by rail to a Klickitat County landfill.
A separate county recycling area is across the street, but the transfer station also has bins for materials such as corrugated cardboard and aluminum. Large pieces of scrap metal — drained lawn mowers, certain appliances — can be tossed into a container directly outside the new building at the far end of the parking area.
An Edmonds accountant last week parked his pickup next to the container, which is placed below the grade, then tipped an old hot-water heater upright and flipped it in. It landed with a satisfying crash, bouncing off a pile of tubular, white bed frames.
"Took care of that," said the man, who declined to give his name.
Wells, who was moving to Yakima, said she missed the symbolism of dropping her junk into a hole.
"I kind of miss the pit," she said. "It was more final."
But her sister-in-law, Teresa Cutrell of Omak, was impressed. Even the public art is notable — a mammoth wall mosaic made of recycled cans, wood and other materials.
"This is pretty classy compared to ours," Cutrell said. "Ours just has a couple trees they planted. And they died."
Diane Brooks: 425-745-7802 or dbrooks@seattletimes.com
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