Were you one of the thousands of people this spring or fall who picked up — and hopefully planted — one of 5,000 trees the city hopes to add to Vancouver’s urban forest?
One homeowner, “leaf raker” and professed lover of plants says this laudable goal of planting thousand more trees does not comply with changes to the city’s leaf collection schedule.
“It’s like the right hand is not talking to the left,” said Eileen Mosca, a Vancouver commercial artist who has lived in her Grandview-Woodlands home for 35 years.
In previous years starting the first day of October, city crews collected bags of leaves on the same day as green bins. Leaves can still be placed in green bins, but that weekly pickup of extra leaves has been reduced to once a month because there is too much to collect through the fall.
“In the past, crews were unable to collect all the extra bags and bins set out for collection on green bin pick up day due to the large volume of leaves,” a city communications staffer wrote in an email to the Courier.
“Trucks were already running at capacity on green bin days before the additional collection of leaves. The change to weekend collection allows Sanitation Operations to mobilize the entire fleet of collection trucks and provide city-wide coverage, improving service to the public.”
As before, leaves must be in bins or biodegradable, paper bags. Plastic bags will not be picked up.
Leaf collection is scheduled for:
- Oct. 24 and 25
- Nov. 14 and 15
- Dec. 12 and 13
- Jan. 16 and 17, includes Christmas trees.
The reduced collection does not complement the attempt to grow more trees in the city, said Mosca. Instead, it off-loads the burden on residents.
“If they are adding trees to the urban forest, the volume is only going to grow,” she said. “They do acknowledge there is an increase in volume. They are telling the residents they have to deal with it.”
Since 2010, the park board has planted roughly 37,000 new trees in an effort to reach the city’s goal of 150,000 trees on public property such as parks and boulevards by 2020. According to the park board, Vancouver has more than 144,000 trees on boulevards and approximately 300,000 more trees growing in parks. There is no tally for the number of trees on private land.
Mosca has 11 trees on her small property, including two hazelnut, a gingko, an oak and multiple Christmas trees — a scotch pine and blue spruce among them — that have grown tall since being planted after the holiday ended. Storing an increasing number of bags on her property is not ideal, especially since she and numerous neighbours take responsibility to rake the streets, too.
“Leaves can be slippery and need to be cleaned up,” she said, noting the change in schedule is “not the story of the century” but one that nonetheless affects many in Vancouver.
The city issued these leaf collection reminders:
- Put extra leaves into store-bought bins or biodegradable paper yard waste bags.
- Leaves may be collected on either Saturday or Sunday (not both days). Set your leaves out for collection before 7 a.m. on the scheduled Saturday.
- Store extra leaves in a dry or covered area until the collection weekend.
- Rake and clear leaves from storm drains to help prevent flooding.
- Don’t put other yard waste and food scraps into these bins and bags. Extra leaves get composted at a different facility.
- Don’t use plastic bags. City crews won’t pick up leaves in plastic bags.
- Please do not sweep leaves onto the street because this can cause flooding.
@MHStewart
