University of Virginia Library

Committee Seeks Answer
To Where Garbage Will Go

News Analysis

By MARY ANN HUEY

Most dorm residents and
apartment dwellers are all too
familiar with the early-morning
symphony of grinding gears
and falling garbage that
accompanies the presence of
the renown "dempsy
dumpster."

And when the dumpster is
gone, so is the noise and last
night's garbage–all gone to
that great sanitary landfill
beyond the horizon.

Ed Schneider is the owner
of that dumpster, and the
county landfill he uses is not
completely sanitary. At
present, Mr. Schneider does
not know what he will do with
the empty toothpaste tubes
and cigarette butts and
applecores next month if the
City-County Joint Landfill
Committee fails to find a new
site to deposit garbage.

Why all the difficulty with
the garbage?

A committee composed of
city and county officials
naturally causes trouble. Add
to it a past record of
city-county mismanagement of
open landfill sites plus a
tremendous amount of public
reaction to any site that is even
considered, and there are
problems.

The committee, composed
of two member of the County
Board of Supervisors, two
member of the City Council,
two attorneys and two
engineers have until June 29 to
find an agreeable site for solid
waste. The word "agreeable"
seems to be the main point of
contention.

Future Garbage

The county is looking for a
site north of Charlottesville,
because, according to growth
projections, this is where the
bulk of future garbage will
originate.

The city, on the other hand,
needs a site that will be close
enough to its population so
that its citizens will not be
drained financially by footing
the cost of transportation to
the site. And as far as both the
city and county residents are
concerned, "nobody wants
one-anywhere near them."

Presently, both the city and
county are using the county
landfill site at Ivy, and
according to estimates, this site
could conceivably
accommodate both the city
and county for 20 years.
However, because of poor
access roads, increasing traffic
and citizen discontent, the
County Zoning Board of
Appeals denied the city the
usage of the Ivy site last
February.

The city took their case to
court and U.S. Circuit Court
Judge Berry granted them a
temporary restraining order
enabling them to use the
landfill over the county's
objections.

Joint Effort

Theoretically, the city of
Charlottesville alone is in a
crisis stage. But, the county,
foreseeing increasing costs in
meeting the state's stricter
landfill requirements, has
joined with the city to find a
site they can jointly use for
approximately five to 10 years.
In the future, they plan to
work together in implementing
alternatives to the landfills.

One of the most attractive
alternatives to a landfill is
incineration to produce steam
energy. Its originator and most
enthusiastic proponent,
Mechanical Engineering Assoc.
Prof. F.A. Iachetta, said his
plan can be put into effect
now, and in four years the
steam from the incineration of
city and county wastes could
provide 75 per cent of the
energy for the University. This
would eliminate the coal pile
by the hospital.

"We would incinerate it
rather close to the University
and we would still have to take
the residue to a landfill–Ivy,
perhaps," Mr. Iachetta said.
"But if we do a calculation,
they would save the equivalent