How do buildings keep their trash chutes and trash holding areas clean?
Asked by
JLeslie (
65743
)
August 26th, 2019
from iPhone
Do buildings do any sort of periodic cleaning of trash chutes and trash holding areas to keep it from becoming very smelly or overridden with bacteria?
I’m in a building right now that has a trash problem, the hallway smells like trash and fragrance, and all the buildings I’ve lived in or spent time in I’ve never had a problem. There isn’t much air conditioning in the hall either, so that might be an added problem.
I don’t have a long lease here or anything, thank goodness, but it just has me wondering how buildings usually handle trash. I think if they did a massive clean it would help. I don’t even know if there is such a thing.
I was also thinking maybe the trash holding area doesn’t have some sort of door in the basement that keeps the smell from coming back up to the floors.
The smell isn’t very strong, but it is noticeable, and I would die if I owned a condo apartment here. If I had bought in the winter maybe when the smell is less of a problem I would be in a panic.
The trash room on each floor even has a door, and then the chute in a room, and it’s a problem.
I’ve lived in or visited relatives in buildings my whole life and have never encountered this.
Do you think there are city codes or regulations about it?
Observing members:
0
Composing members:
0
9 Answers
Your description reminds me of the apartment building I lived in in college. It was an old hotel turned into a high rise of studio apartments. You could find your way to the trash area just by following the trail of grime.
Gross. Lol. This is a fairly expensive high rise. The apartment itself is fully remodeled. It has a doorman, nice lounge area with free coffee, and a decent gym. They just have to fix the trash!
Janitors.
In ours anyway.
Yes, I lived in a 28 story high rise apartment block that had a trash chute from top floor straight to the garbage bin outside.
They had regular cleaning of that chute about once a month or if it needed in between they had it done by professionals. I think that they steam cleaned it with special equipment.
Are the halls carpeted? Lots of people take out bags of trash with holes that drip gunk on the way to the trash chute. If that’s the case, and the carpets aren’t cleaned regularly with an enzyme product that dissolves the stuff causing the odor, you’ll have this problem. The enzyme product is quite expensive, by the way.
Edit: The chutes and holding area can be sprayed down with the same product.
The buildings I have lived in that had garbage chutes had a spring loaded door at the bottom, so it would close once the garbage had passed through. That way, odors wouldn’t travel back up from the dumpster in the basement.
And, it helps to have the dumpster emptied more than once a week, and also cleaned every so often.
I bet there’s a fan that is supposed to pull air through and out of the trash chutes. If that fan isn’t functioning properly, you could expect a stench.
Are you in an apartment rather than a house now?
@janbb My husband is in a corporate apartment. I’m here, in Nashville, visiting him.
Answer this question 
Composing members:
0
