Every town on Cape Cod has one and sooner or later, everyone goes there. We’re not talking restaurants, bars, gyms, or even Dunkin’ Donuts, we’re talking the dump. Or landfill or waste disposal area, if you’re posh. The Cape’s dumps are widely used but what do you really know about them?
Do you know the dump is a good place to find – in the immortal words of the late, lamented Building 19 — good stuff cheap? (And by cheap, we mean free.)
Or that one Cape Cod dump has a golf course?
And that some are even generating electricity?
Check out our gallery for a peek into The Secret Life of Cape Cod Dumps.
THE YARMOUTH DISPOSAL AREA
This golf course was once the Yarmouth dump.
This town dump is also a golf course – sort of. The links to the west of the disposal area are an extension of the Bayberry Hills Golf Course. However, 25 years ago the nine-hole extension was a 57-acre solid-waste landfill that had been in operation since the 1950s. It was capped in 1997 and it became the golf course, a bike path extension, and Peter Homer Park on Old Townhouse Road. In addition to the nine holes, the disposal area itself has other advantages.
“It has a very efficient layout,” says the Head of the Yarmouth DPW, Jeff Colby. “Residents drive around a circular layout that provides ready access to trash disposal and recycling facilities.”
There is another unique feature of this disposal area, Colby said.
“Yarmouth also has a rail loading facility for trash disposal that most communities do not have.”
THE EASTHAM LANDFILL
Used furniture is up for grabs at the Eastham dump
You probably never thought to go shopping at the dump. But maybe that’s because you’ve never been to the Eastham Stock Exchange.
The swap shop is located at the town landfill and residents bring in used but useable items and usually leave with something else.
“It is clean and organized,” says Gate Attendant Ray Geoffrion. “It is also staffed by a group of friendly and dedicated volunteers.”
The Stock Exchange became a source of controversy in 2014 when it was closed for a time when someone decided to use it as a bathroom. Ew.
The town also had to put regulations in place to keep people from taking items from the swap shop and then selling them. Furniture and larger items that don’t fit in the swap shop are left in a designated area by the exit and are also free for the taking.
The swap shop is open from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturdays, Sundays and Wednesdays. Check it out late on the weekend when all the unsold yard sale items wind up there.
THE CHATHAM TRANSFER STATION AND RECYCLING CENTER
Solar panels generate electricity at the Chatham dump.
Leave it to Chatham to give their dump a fancy-sounding name – and a fabulous collection of solar panels.
The solar array sits on the capped portion of the landfill and interim DPW Director Bob Rooney says it’s the most popular part of the town’s disposal area.
“While this is not part of the Transfer Station operation, it provides the backdrop to residents who use the facility and most of the questions to the staff aren’t about the trash, but about the Town’s efforts to generate almost a megawatt of electricity on a closed landfill,” he said.
Chatham also puts discarded food to good use.
“The Town collects food waste,” Rooney said. “It’s then recycled to Watt’s Family Farm where they use it for their hogs or composting. This is a voluntary separation and we get several barrels of waste per week.”
So not only is the dump generating electricity, it’s also keeping the pigs happy. A win-win!
(Note: a number of other Cape towns also have solar arrays in their capped landfills. Harwich has a sign located near their solar array alerting residents how much money the renewable energy source is saving the town. The Dennis Solar Farm is estimated to save half a million dollars per year over the next 20 years.)
THE BOURNE TOWN LANDFILL
Do some shopping at Dorothy’s Swap shop at the Bourne dump.
In the old days it was called dump-picking. But now many local dumps have swap shops and in Bourne the shop is named for longtime Bourne volunteer Dorothy Wilson. Dorothy’s Swap Shop is a great place for residents to mingle, catch up on town gossip and find great things to take home.
Phil Goddard, Manager of Facility Compliance and Technology Development in Bourne said the shop is especially spiffy after it was rebuilt and expanded and new lighting added several years ago.
“We frequently receive compliments from the public,” he said.
Bourne is also hopping on the alternative energy bandwagon. The latest project is a lease for about 4.5 acres of land the town signed with Harvest Power, Inc. where the town will build, own and operate an anaerobic digester, Goddard said.
The “digester” – which sounds like some kind of mutant zombie thing – will convert food waste, bio-solids, and other organics into biogas that contains methane. The town will use the methane, along with landfill gas, as a fuel for engines generating approximately 4-5 megawatts of renewable electricity.
Now that’s recycling!
— By Christopher Setterlund
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