Lenox to get transfer station

By Kate Abbott12:00AM / Wednesday, October 29, 2003Print Story | Email Story

LENOX DALE â€” The Center for Ecological Technology will be moving its recycling program from Hubbard Street in Pittsfield to the transfer station in Lenox Dale, and Lenox residents may see a wider range of options for disposing of their own recyclables, according to Meg Morris, manager of community and governmental relations at Eco/Pittsfield. Morris spoke at the Oct. 22 meeting of the Lenox select board about the changes Lenox residents will see in the transfer station. She also suggested options for making Lenoxâ€™s waste collection system more efficient, cheaper and more environmentally sound. These could include waste collection days for appliances and substances that are hard to dispose of, an adjustment of rates to make recycling free at the transfer station and, at their most conjectural, a town-run trash collection system. Eco/Pittsfield took over the management of the transfer station in July. It is a subsidiary of EnergyAnswers Corp. of Albany, N.Y., which develops waste management strategies with environmentally sound technologies. Eco/Pittsfield owns and operates the Pittsfield Resource Recovery Facility, and has been working with Pittsfield for more than five years. The Center for Ecological Technology has entered into an agreement with Eco/Pittsfield to operate a recycling program at the Lenox transfer station, according to Alan Silverstein, co-director of CET. They have already begun to move the recycling program from Hubbard Street, Pittsfield, to the Lenox transfer station. They should have the program fully moved and the shredder set up in the new location within the next three weeks, he said. CETâ€™s recycling program lets businesses recycle waste paper, Morris said. It collects paper and shreds records for businesses from Great Barrington to North Adams. â€œIt processes 47 tons of paper a month. Thatâ€™s two compactor boxes,â€ Morris said. â€œYou had more traffic with the old system. BFI, the previous operator, processed 49 tons of garbage a day. We are now processing 100 to 150 tons of garbage a month,â€ she said. Eco/Pittsfield is scaling back the Lenox transfer station to eliminate traffic from commercial haulers, she said. The transfer station operates Monday to Friday, 3 to 7 p.m. It is still phasing out commercial haulers in favor of recyclables, and while the commercial haulers still use the facility, it will have to be open when they come. â€œIf we could close Monday, we could be open Tuesday through Saturday,â€ she said. Lenox residents coming to drop off trash will now be scaled in and out of the transfer station â€” they will drive over the scale and the transfer station will bill them for their for garbage by weight. Each trip costs a minimum $5 to cover the overhead costs of processing the trash. A pickup truck carrying a half a ton of old ceramic toilets would be charged $37.50 (at $75 per ton), for example, Morris said. The average householder dropping off trash every two weeks would probably pay $5. Recycling costs $40 a ton now, and Eco/Pittsfield could change those rates to make recycling free, if the select board preferred, she said. Representatives from the Lenox Board of Health encouraged the select board to make recycling free, to give residents as much incentive as possible to recycle whenever they could. â€œIs there anything you donâ€™t take?â€ asked Selectman Janet Pumphrey. Massachusetts has waste bans, Morris said. The transfer station cannot take products containing mercury or freon, for instance. Lenox could arrange to dispose of hazardous materials and appliances on specific days, she said. In the Pittsfield facility, Eco/Pittsfield has two collection days a year when residents can bring in appliances. The city council establishes prices for different kinds of items. Lenox could appropriate funds at town meeting rather than charging per item at the collection days, but a charge helped people to understand that it costs to get rid of these things, she said. It also encouraged people to get creative about re-using their appliances â€” donate the washer to a niece just out of college rather than leaving it on the curb. A pickup at the Lenox transfer station would be for Lee and Lenox residents only, and would not accept more than a pickup truck load, Morris said, adding that in New York State, town officials often volunteered to help at these collections. There are people in the Berkshires who can take appliances without freon, she said, but most are not convenient to Lenox. Waste management in much of the Berkshires could be better, Morris said. It is not as efficient and cost effective here as it is at facilities in Pioneer valley. Distance contributes to this comparative inefficiency. Berkshire transfer stations have to bring recyclables to Springfield, which is a longer haul and more expensive. It is also a question of when haulers collect garbage, she said. Lenox has several private haulers in town, and may have five different haulers on the same street at five different times. Collection could be more efficient. Many towns create a garbage district and put out a bid for curbside collection, she said. Such a district could create problems since, as select board chairman Timothy Doherty pointed out, if one hauler is collecting all of the trash in Lenox, other haulers are not. To try not to put smaller haulers at a disadvantage, or out of business, the town could create several districts and bid each, Morris said. The town could also require in the bid that the hauler dispose of the garbage at a place of the townâ€™s choosing, so that larger haulers with their own disposal sites did not have that advantage over smaller ones. She has seen curbside pickup in small, widespread rural communities as well as densely populated areas, she said â€” Richmond has municipal trash collection, for instance. Joseph Kellogg from the Lenox Board of Health recommended that Lenox and Lee consider banding together to contract one hauler. Stockbridge, the other branch of tri-town health, has its own transfer station and subsidizes it with tax revenue, and would not need to join in. A town-run trash collection could provide cheaper service, Kellogg said. Right now, average Lenox resident pays $26 a month to dispose of trash. â€œComparison with other towns suggests that figure could be reduced,â€ he said. The town would also have some control over the way its trash and recyclables were collected and disposed of, he said. The board of health has had complaints that recyclables were thrown in with regular garbage, and that trucks crossed and re-crossed town borders when they collected garbage, so the towns could not keep track of which recyclables went where. â€œWe could run it as an enterprise, like water and sewer,â€ he said. â€œWe could not require residents to join it.â€ Doherty asked whether the town would have to run the operation â€” to send out bills. Lenox has been slimming down town government as much as possible in tight budgeting times, he said. It is daunting to take on more government now. â€œWhere do we go from here?â€ he asked. The Board of Health would eventually like to see curbside trash haulers picking up trash and recycling and charging the house owner for trash by weight â€” keeping the recycling free â€” Kellogg said. He and other board of health representatives promised to come back to the select board with a more concrete proposal, with Eco/Pittsfield and CET cooperation.

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Lanesborough Fifth-Graders Win Snowplow Name Contest

02:13PM / Tuesday, December 23, 2025

LANESBOROUGH, Mass. — One of the snowplows for Highway District 1 has a new name: "The Blizzard Boss."

The name comes from teacher Gina Wagner's fifth-grade class at Lanesborough Elementary School.

The state Department of Transportation announced the winners of the fourth annual "Name A Snowplow" contest on Monday.

The department received entries from public elementary and middle school classrooms across the commonwealth to name the 12 MassDOT snowplows that will be in service during the 2025/2026 winter season.

The purpose of the contest is to celebrate the snow and ice season and to recognize the hard work and dedication shown by public works employees and contractors during winter operations.

"Thank you to all of the students who participated. Your creativity allows us to highlight to all, the importance of the work performed by our workforce," said interim MassDOT Secretary Phil Eng.

"Our workforce takes pride as they clear snow and ice, keeping our roads safe during adverse weather events for all that need to travel. ?To our contest winners and participants, know that you have added some fun to the serious take of operating plows. ?I'm proud of the skill and dedication from our crews and thank the public of the shared responsibility to slow down, give plows space and put safety first every time there is a winter weather event."

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