FORT WORTH — You know what they say: One man's trash is another man's — well, trash — when there's so much of it the wind starts to spread it around.
Strong gusts sent bags and plastic bottles tumbling down some south Fort Worth streets because carts were overflowing with two weeks of uncollected garbage.
"Last week, except for Monday, we had to cancel the rest of the week because of ice," said Fort Worth code compliance director Brandon Bennett. "Yesterday was the first day doing double collections, went late into the evening."
Bennett said collection crews gave it a good try again starting well before dawn on Wednesday.
"We knew the ice was coming," he said. "We put the trucks out as early as 5. They worked as hard as they could, but come about 8 o'clock it got so icy they started sliding, almost hitting parked cars, mailboxes."
Not only that — it was so cold that garbage was sticking inside the cans and wouldn't fall out.
Crews did finish some streets before the weather forced them to retreat. Fort Worth customers are supposed to use only wheeled trash carts, but the city is also permitting the use of bags for now.
"No we're not going to charge extra for bags that get set out," Bennett promised. "This is two weeks' worth of garbage; we know it's not going to fit in everybody's cans."
Arlington workers also tried to complete pick-ups scheduled for Wednesday, but hazardous streets forced them to call off the effort around 11 a.m. Residents who missed collection Wednesday will need to wait until their next scheduled pick up on Saturday.
E-mail jdouglas@wfaa.com
