As you drive around Dalton in the mornings, you’ve likely seen blue bins lined up along the street. The city of Dalton offers free curbside recycling to all residents and together our recyclers stack up some big recycling numbers.
The blue bins are picked up once a week by the curbside recycling team. They sort and separate each item in the blue bins by hand and deposit into various compartments in the collection truck. The drivers handle more than 4,000 blue bins each week. It is through their work that Dalton was able to collect enough recyclables to weigh, 1,428,500 pounds, or approximately 2,380 grizzly bears.
Recycling has a ton of benefits for our area and beyond. With the help of our residents that recycle we have saved 1,190 cubic yards of landfill space which aids in extending the life of the Old Dixie Highway landfill in Whitfield County, meaning we don’t have to use as much land to store our trash. To help visualize how much land that is, think of stacking 1,190 dishwashers together and it will give you a good picture.
Some 6.3% of Dalton’s waste was diverted to recycling to be turned into new books, carpet, cereal boxes and more. If only paper had been collected, the 714.25 tons would save 12,142 trees in 2023.
When you put something in your blue bin to be recycled instead of throwing it away it is sent to manufacturers that use recycled material to make their products. This helps conserve our natural resources and can save energy and water in production.
The curbside recycling program began in 1991 and continues today thanks to the Dalton Public Works Department. The program is entirely free for residents of Dalton. To receive a blue bin for recycling pickup, call public works at (706) 278-7077. They will deliver your bins to your home promptly. You may request up to three recycling bins for free depending on the size of your household.
Inside the blue bins, multiple types of items can be recycled. You can recycle paper, cardboard, aluminum, bimetal cans and plastic jugs and bottles. It is fine to leave the labels and lids on containers inside the bin, in fact your plastic bottle caps are turned into toothbrush handles.
There are some important rules to make sure that your item ends up at the recycling center and not in the “wish-cycling” pile. Items that cannot be accepted for recycling include any soiled items or waxed paper and cardboard. Make sure that any materials put into your recycling bin are clean and contain no food residue. When the materials are mixed together for the process of recycling, food waste from one container can contaminate the other materials and cause problems such as mold or bacteria as they are stored before recycling.
To make the process easier, you do not have to separate your recycling into different bins before it is picked up, but there are good and bad ways to pack your bin. If you only have one bin, place all of the paper on the bottom and containers on top. Avoid littering your street by overloading the bin, which can be helped by crushing plastic and aluminum containers and breaking down or flattening boxes. Your cardboard must fit in the blue box for it to be recycled curbside. If it cannot fit in the box, you may take it to any convenience center to recycle for free. You can find the location closest to you at https://www.dwswa.org/conveniencecenters.
Recycling instructions are available online at the city of Dalton website at www.cityofdalton-ga.gov. Click on Departments, then Public Works and Recycling Instructions to watch instructional videos and download the one-page recycling guide. Through this program you get to help save the world just by putting out that blue bin every week.
Amy Hartline is the recycling and education program coordinator for the Dalton-Whitfield Solid Waste Authority. Have a recycling question? Contact her at (706) 278-5001 or ahartline@dwswa.org.