Room to grow

As the number of landfills shrinks, it has become increasingly important to build regional transfer facilities, often positioned near the edges of metropolitan areas, to move a high volume of material through efficiently and effectively.

During a 2024 WasteExpo session titled The Future of Transfer Stations, Conner McCallie, operations and business development director for Chattanooga, Tennessee-based Atomic Transport, joined John Lloyd, vice president of Shakopee, Minnesota-based Lloyd’s Construction Services, which operates two transfer stations, to discuss how facility design and operations have adapted to the ebbs and flows of the industry.

As a family-owned hauling company, Atomic Transport provides bulk transfer hauling services to collection companies. The company works with a wide range of national, regional and local collection companies that deliver collected waste to a transfer station, where Atomic Transport picks it up and transports it to a landfill.

Atomic Transport hauls out of about 90 different transfer stations and recycling facilities across the country. Over the years, the company has collaborated with many of its customers on the design of new transfer stations.

Reverse-engineering a transfer station to streamline inbound and outbound processes can help increase cash flow, McCallie said, ultimately leading to improved revenue streams for operators. “The main goal of the transfer station is to get your collection trucks in and out and back on the road,” he added.

When designing a transfer station for efficiency, safety and longevity, McCallie and Lloyd agreed it’s important to keep the following factors in mind.

Traffic flow

At a transfer station, tonnage always will be limited by storage capacity, McCallie said. Facilities only have so much space, which is why it’s essential to manage synergies between inbound and outbound traffic.

When it comes to inbound efficiency, McCallie said, engineering site traffic flow for the maximum expected tonnage rather than the minimum is the most important factor. When deciding how many tipping bays to incorporate in a transfer facility’s design, owners should take the average anticipated tonnage per hour, keeping peak hours in mind, and divide that by the average time per tip, for example, 10 minutes per tip.

Providing plenty of tipping bay space allows operators to manage traffic at a more consistent pace than when constrained by tight space. It also increases safety.

“You’re not having as many equipment-on-equipment collisions within the transfer station when you’re not stacked up on each other like that,” McCallie said. “Tight spaces and heavy equipment just never mix.”

Ample temporary storage

Loading an outbound 18-wheeler should take about 15 to 20 minutes, McCallie said, but timing inbound and outbound traffic to allow for immediate loading isn’t always that simple. Consistently managing inbound materials often means it’s more important to get trucks through the line than to load outbound trucks—and that’s where a temporary storage area comes into play.

“You’re going to have peak rushes,” McCallie said. “So having a temporary storage area where those heavy equipment operators can move the material and then come back to it when they’re ready to load is efficient for your collection trucks.”

To create these storage areas, McCallie suggested using concrete push walls with inlaid steel plating. These types of push walls are engineered for durability as the steel makes them sturdier than regular concrete, and they are less likely to wear over time.

Balanced design

An efficient transfer station design will keep material flowing smoothly and safely. However, in an inefficiently designed transfer station, material could be stored in an area on one end of the station and loaded into outbound trucks on the opposite end of the facility. This type of layout requires loaders to traverse the entire facility, crossing every tipping bay, and increasing the opportunity for accidents.

Instead, McCallie suggested a more efficient design that incorporates two storage areas—one on each side of the transfer station—with loading pits situated in the rear of the facility.

Raised pit configuration

When designing a transfer station, a top consideration is how to move material to clear the tipping floor. The most efficiently designed pit areas, McCallie said, require only one piece of equipment for this task: a front-end wheel loader. Building a raised pit that’s shallower than traditional designs can eliminate the need for an excavator or other pieces of equipment.

Raised pits also allow for trucks to sit above the tipping floor. McCallie suggested building a pit that exposes 5 to 6 feet of trailer at the top. This configuration provides increased visibility and safety over alternative designs. Wheel loaders also have the ability to tamp more efficiently without the use of an excavator.

Room for expansion

To build for longevity, Lloyd said, it’s essential to consider the possibility for future expansion. For owners that have the option, he said, it’s best not to build the facility near the property line.

“If you’ve got 50-foot setbacks in the city code or county code, put [the facility] out farther so that you can expand,” Lloyd said. “Maybe you don’t want to put in two load-in pits right away but have the capability to add on.”

Taking the time to think through the design of a transfer station and making decisions with the future in mind always will be worth the extra effort, Lloyd said.

“When you’re designing one of these [transfer stations], ... it’s expensive and it seems excessive,” he said of taking the future into consideration. “But it’s not. You need to build this thing for longevity.”

The author is managing editor for Waste Today and can be reached at smann@gie.net.