Here's what happens to SF's 500 tons of Christmas trees 🎄
Recology driver Rogelio Gutierrez has a pine needle stuck dangerously close to his eyeball. He’s just dragged three burly Christmas trees from the corner of Clay and Spruce Streets in Laurel Heights into his recycling truck, but he’s been doing this job so long, he doesn’t even notice the tiny green fleck stuck between his outer eyelid and bushy eyebrows. As he reflects on his 25-year career, it wiggles back and forth, like a gigantic eyelash.
“At the end, you can have pine needles everywhere. On your back, in your underwear, you name it. I guess I get used to it, I don’t even feel it,” he says, flicking the needle from his face., twenty trucks sweep through every residential street in San Francisco to dispose of 500 tons of Christmas spirit. Each truck has an official capacity of 371 trees , but Gutierrez says that given the variations of sizes, during the end of the collection period he picks up nearly 1,000 every day.
“You throw them in there, you make a Mexican tortilla out of a Christmas tree,” says Rogelio, describing the process by which the truck compresses each tree. “You squeeze it pretty good.”The full trucks head to Recology’s Brisbane complex where they drop the trees into a mountainous pile . A massive wood chipper the size of luxury yacht shreds the trees into mulch that’s used for landscaping Bay Area public parks.
So next time you’re unpacking a picnic lunch, you can thank drivers like Gutierrez for the wood chips under your feet. His job isn’t exactly glamorous, but he’s happy to have spent nearly half of his life doing it. He’s sent his kids through college and feels proud to help keep the city clean. During the holidays people often leave out chocolates as a gift for drivers, but another way to make Gutierrez’s day a little brighter is just to put out your tree correctly. Don’t place it in a plastic bag . Leave it on the street the night before your regular trash collection with the stand and ornaments removed. Cut trees larger than six feet in half .
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