Some day, instead of arriving with a truckload of garbage you might be bringing along your child's sled while visiting the dump. The city's public works department is looking towards the future in trying to decide what to do with the dump once it runs out of room. As reporter Mike W. Bryant discovered, one scenario includes turning the current site into a park and toboggan hill.
Mike W. Bryant
Northern News Services
Yellowknife (May 30/01) - Some of the ideas we were talking about are typical of other ideas elsewhere," said Greg Kehoe, manager of public works.
"Since our landfill is a little high we were thinking about a toboggan hill. Of course, that's years away and will depend on community interest and cost."
The dump has been in use since the early '70s and is estimated to reach full capacity within seven years.
When that happens, the public works department will cap the existing landfill and extend the dump into the adjacent lot, which includes the Volker Stevin gravel quarry.
"They're blasting over there for their own material (gravel), so that's a good place to start the expansion of the landfill," Kehoe said.
The landfill cap will be approximately three to four feet deep, and made up of three different layers: peat, sand and silt. The peat itself will come from a swamp located inside the dump.
Capping will be completed section by section until the current dump is entirely covered, and the new site begun.
"You're trying to keep rain away from the garbage," Kehoe explained.
"Ideally, what the top layer will do is shed water away, and the reason for the peat layer on top is to hopefully get something growing there."
Underneath the landfill are the garbage bails. With a force of 2,000 pounds per square inch, the garbage is pressed into cubes weighing nearly a ton each at the dump's bailing facility.
Rubber tires, coffee cans, and even household appliances -- anything that makes it into local garbage bins -- are all pressed into bails that make up the bulk of the landfill.
They are then stacked several feet deep and contoured to fit the natural rock formations of the area so that every available amount of space is filled.
With 200 bails of household garbage processed every week it is little wonder that finding space for it all is ongoing dilemma.
"A garbage layer is loaded on top of the bails, and then the cap is put on top," said Bruce Underhay, sub-foreman for the bailing facility.
He explained that they need to pile loose garbage on top of the bails, otherwise material from the cap would seep into the cracks in between them, leaving parts of the landfill exposed.
Atop the garbage bails, thousands of gulls and ravens get one last chance to peck at them for loose food remnants before they are buried under with sand and silt.
"It's feeding time," Underhay mused.
Besides the bails, the dump is broken down into several sections and reserved for other waste materials.
Just beyond the gate, one section is devoted to empty propane tanks and paint cans. In another area, old pallets and scrap wood is piled several feet high. Broken glass fills another section.
Whatever is not gathered and shipped to Edmonton to be recycled is often salvaged by visitors to the dump looking for cheap firewood or something that can be fixed up and resold.
"Just about everything out here is used in one way or another," said Underhay, pointing to the pile of broken glass that will be used as a substrate for capping the bails.
"Even the contaminated soil is used for the landfill."
Converting landfill to parkland or land for residential or commercial development is nothing new to Yellowknife.
William McDonald school was built on what use to be the dump during the '60s. Likewise, Fritz Theil Park sits on top of a landfill that was covered up in 1973.
"They landfilled it (Fritz Theil Park) much as they do now," said Grant Beck, superintendent of public works. "But they hauled much of it (garbage) out of there to the current landfill.
"They made it into a temporary trailer court, and then into the current ball park later."
Over the last 30 some odd years Beck has seen a lot of changes in the way Yellowknife deals with its garbage. For instance, the annual sight of thick, black smoke rising across the skyline is a thing of the past. Burning garbage at the dump is no longer allowed.
"They allowed burning back then and it would cause problems," Beck said.
"It would smoulder all winter long and then spring would come and it would flare up again.
"Now they control and monitor it. They try to keep it (garbage) covered when they backfill."
True enough, the old days of dumping whenever and wherever one pleased are long gone. The gatehouse attendant at the dump entrance directs vehicles to the appropriate areas, and strict hours are enforced to ensure against illegal dumping.
"There were people living here a few years ago," added Underhay.
The dump has come a long way since the more haphazard days of the '70s and early '80s. And in a few years the bickering gulls, blowing garbage, and the permeating smell of rotting waste will likely be replaced by something a little more pleasant and greener.
The public works department is still mulling it over, having hired a local consulting firm to help them figure out what is most appropriate for the current site.
Even if the city was successful in turning the dump into a park, it is still unknown as to how the new dump next door will effect it. Moreover, there is still no price tag on the plan.
"There's all sorts of ideas, but we don't want to get people excited," said Kehoe.
"We're trying to incorporate it into the cost of the facility."
