Tahoe Dumpsters gleam with the theme of clean

It looks sleek like a Cadillac, but smells like garbage.

Its ugly forklift handles are tucked inside, and this Dumpster gleams with a theme of clean.

New Dumpsters have arrived in town, ones meant to be appealing and not detract from the beauty of the area. The gray-and-brown steel receptacles are probably the first group of Dumpsters in the country designed to blend into their surroundings.

A normal Dumpster costs about $600 -- these cost $1,300. Clean Tahoe had a manufacturer build eight of the Dumpsters after South Tahoe Refuse helped build a prototype. Their exteriors are shielded with panels of recycled wood and plastic.

"They're good looking," said Stan Burton, program manager at Clean Tahoe. "They can be sitting in an unattractive area and enhance the area."

The Dumpsters, mounted on pavement not wheels, can't be moved unless a refuse truck hooks it with a forklift. A mattress can't be stuffed in it because it has two chutes, not just one large enough to fit garbage illegal for Dumpsters such as a mattress or a television. And the heavy, latched steel lids keep foraging animals out.

It took welders at South Tahoe Refuse 124 hours to make the prototype in October 2001. It was placed next to the South Lake Tahoe Chamber of Commerce in January 2002.

Feedback from the community was positive, so five Dumpsters were ordered by Clean Tahoe, a nonprofit refuse business funded by the city and El Dorado County. The county also tapped a pool of state money, produced from the recycling of cans and bottles, to buy three more Dumpsters.

"It's certainly our goal to improve scenic quality," said Ginger Huber, Tahoe division environmental manager for the county. "I hope anybody who drives through Tahoe looks closely at these and takes the idea back to their communities."

Ron Rumble, owner of Rainbow Mountain on Ski Run Boulevard, is a former board member of Clean Tahoe. He came up with the concept of a designer Dumpster, Burton said.

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To order a scenery-enhancing Dumpster, contact Clean Tahoe at (530) 544-4210.