Above, one of three mounds at the Seneca Meadows Landfill in Waterloo, NY, as seen from the west side of Seneca Lake approximately eight miles away (through a telephoto lens). Credit: Kevin Colton, HWS.

EPA Region Map

EPA Region Map
EPA Region Map

Monday, February 28, 2011




While walking around downtown last week I saw a few things that caught my eye. Firstly, at 317 South Main St. there is an old broken down building, with the facade still intact, but it was clear that the inside was in the process of being demolished or renovated. I saw large pieces of building materials and wondered what they were going to do with all of that building waste. Later, I saw a couple of packer trucks around town that I didn't recognize. Being such a large and successful company, I figured that Casella would have monopolized the waste management industry around Geneva. However, after some investigation on their website, I found out that Feher is a locally owned and run company (based in Syracuse, with branches in Geneva, Utica, and Watertown) that handles municipal waste, recycling, commercial waste, and industrial waste. They rent out and collect from various sizes of container, from normal trash cans to large dumpsters, in addition to rental of on-site compaction units, and on-site confidential paper shredding. What was particularly interesting to me about Feher is that they seemed to go on rounds right around 5 o-clock, which seemed like a particularly dangerous time for their sand men to be collecting.
So after thinking about all of my observations, I came to the conclusion that places in need to industrial waste removal (like the broken down building at 317 S. Main) would rent a container or compacter from someone like Feher or Casella to deal with the waste generated from demolition or renovation.

1 comment:

  1. That old building is actually the location of a brownfield. It used to be a gas station, so I am assuming there would be underground contamination. The city of Geneva got a lot of money from the EPA to clean it up properly

    http://www.njbrownfield.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=176:geneva&catid=11:grant-management-projects&Itemid=52

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