Yes, you heard that correctly! The City of West Hollywood’s new, solar powered, super compactor receptacles have been disabled this weekend.
WEHOville reached out to Public Facilities and Field Services Director Helen Collins to confirm why Athens Services made the rounds yesterday to install new handles that prevent the receptacle door from opening. A wire mesh can was placed next to the closed “Bigbellys” to handle all the extra garbage that is expected on Sunday.
Helen Collins replied: “From a Public Safety perspective, this is standard operating procedures for large scale events or heavy crowds.”
Please note that the City of West Hollywood has not allocated any funds to close the boulevard during Sunday’s first-ever WeHo Pride. Outzones along the boulevard leave less room for walking traffic. Now the garbage will overflow from the wire can, which has less than half the capacity of the ‘Bigbelly” receptacles.
In a press release dated March 7, 2015, on the City of West Hollywood website, it is noted: “The City of West Hollywood is rolling out a new system for garbage and recycling along Santa Monica Boulevard sidewalks. This week, the City is installing 18 Bigbelly solar-powered compacting containers along one of the most walk-friendly corridors of the City. The receptacles are strategically located along Santa Monica Boulevard in heavily-pedestrianized spots between Doheny Drive and Fairfax Avenue.”
But now, these expensive receptacles are disabled for large functions. You can expect the garbage to overflow onto the sidewalk. And its makes us wonder: Will there be a trash pickup on Sunday morning before the Pride Walk, or will we wake up Sunday to trash overflowing from the wastebaskets after Saturday night?
Welcome to the City of West Hollywood! Don’t trip over the trash.
HOW MUCH DO EACH OF THESE SOLAR POWERED MACHINE OPERATED TRASH CANS COST? AND WHY?? THERE WAS A BIGGER THAN USUAL IN RESIDENTS ANNUAL TRASH SERVICES FROM ATHENS WASTE. IT WAS TO PAY FOR A NEW BIG EXPENSIVE M.E.R.F THAT WOULD DO ALL TRASH AND RECYCLING SEPARATION FASTER AND ONCE DONE, BETTER AT SEPARATING THE DIFFERENT MATERIALS FOR RECYCLING. SO WHY DO WE STILL HAVE RECYCLE AND REGULAR TRASH CANS AND SEPARATE TRUCK PICK UPS IF WE PAID FOR THE NEW M.E.R.F FACILITY. HOW ABOUT ALL THE POLLUTION TWO SETS OF TRASH TRUCKS DOES. ONE FOR BLACK TRASH CANS AND… Read more »
“most walk-friendly corridors of the City” That’s funny, and sad. I am almost run over almost every time i walk on SM blvd by turning cards.
What is going to happen is people will find these receptacles closed and it will train them to not bother using in the future. These receptacles, just like everything else has one chance to make a first impression.
Every time? Come on. But as our mother’s taught us, “always look both ways before crossing the street.” LA drivers not paying attention to pedestrians is a problem all throughout the metropolitan area. You can’t fault the City of West Hollywood for drivers not respecting the right-of-way for pedestrians.
Along this topic, we were promised cleaner streets and sidewalks (and more frequent pickup of abandoned shopping carts). None of this happened. Our sidewalks are as filthy as ever, trash cans overflow and shopping carts are littered throughout our community. Especially filthy are the areas directly in front of store fronts that have taken use of part of the sidewalk (even pre-pandemic). Blackened with filth, these are never power washed and the city does nothing to require businesses that utilize this part of the sidewalk to ever clean them. Ms. Collins needs to be more proactive in ensuring that our… Read more »
My sentiments exactly. Could Ms. Collins bring forward an initiative to do just that……steam clean the sidewalks all over town before it repopulates following the pandemic. Now would be a great time and inspire all neighborhoods to be on their best behavior to beautify the city the old fashioned way, by keeping it clean.
So where are the photos of the aftermath of Sunday’s Pride Parade or gathering?
These must only be on SMB…..as I’ve never seen one.
Guys.
This isn’t uncommon. In fact, several major cities in Europe and east Asia don’t provide public trash cans, or if they do, they’re a bare bones, see-through plastic bag setup. The concern is the hiding of something in the bins, or in the case of Tokyo, a domestic terrorist attack, as what happened in the 80s. It’s probably overkill, but I don’t think this is a sign negligence.
How dumb can one city be?
Grossly overpaid lack of foresight. Preferring to pontificate, City staff rarely wander out of their cubicles to actually see what the city looks and feels like. Sinking lower while they cling to the idea that West Hollywood is some type of Utopia.
Get over yourselves West Hollywood.
Geez! These Bigbelly things should have been gone a long time ago. Now, a wire garbage can AND the non-functioning Bigbelly on the Rocco’s corner will leave even less room for a pedestrian to get around the club’s excessively large and no longer necessary OutZone.
It’s also surprising that the city has “not allocated any funds to close the blvd”….Let’s face it, the city’s finance director better get to a cash machine quick.
Pre-pandemic those BigBelly’s were nasty – I mean who wants to put their hands on that handle?! And now post-pandemic, we need to rethink what we provide and come up with a better solution that doesn’t require someone that wants to dispose of trash to have to touch that handle with their whole hand. Gross. (maybe it’s also giving reason for some folks not to use them and to just drop their trash on the street/sidewalk?).
WTF. A city manager that wasn’t sworn in until a month + after the previous one left. A closed city hall. Closed city counsel meetings to the public, large scale trash receptacle that don’t open for large scale events… I’ll tell what needs to be done: dump the entire greedy, negligent and kick back fed city council in the solar trash cans once Athens opens them again. I hope someone besides me will be taking pictures and video of the first true Weho Pride, I certainly will be. The trash filled streets of West Hollywood are bound to add some… Read more »
I look forward to seeing what *trash* you dug up.
City Council meetings are not closed to the public. I have seen this lie before.
Wish you would stop.
If you read the other comments, the receptacles are locked for our protection.
Joshua, thank you. Exactly. And I watch the City Council meetings on a regular basis.
What do you mean? Arevalo just left this week! He has still heald the title, and has been at all, or most Council meetings. The incoming city manager was getting his feet wet with those meetings.
As far as closed city hall and council meetings, those are coming soon. In a staggered format, starting in July.
https://wehoonline.com/2021/06/30/paul-arevalo-bids-farewell-at-the-state-of-the-city-2021/