Look here to see when your street is scheduled (and when to move your vehicles)
COVINGTON, Ky. – “Every leaf speaks bliss to me, fluttering from the autumn tree,” wrote English poet Emily Bronte some 200 years ago … but then she didn’t have to rake all those falling leaves. If she had, the “speaking” might have included the words of sailors instead of poets.
Hoping to keep both its streets and verbiage clean, the City of Covington will again help residents deal with the beautiful but labor-intensive mess of autumn.
With blowers and two giant vacuum trucks, crews from the City's Public Works Department will start collecting leaves from sidewalks and streets next Wednesday, Oct. 25.
They will follow a formal schedule over the next two months with a special focus on neighborhoods with a lot of trees whose leaves clog gutters and streets in the public right of way.
To give crews room to work, residents are required to move their cars.
To find out when crews will be on your street (and more specifically, on your side of your street) simply click LEAF PICKUP SCHEDULE and type in your address. Note you’ll be given two dates: One for the north or east sides of the street, and one for the south and west sides (depending on how your street is oriented).
(To find out more about the leaf collection operation in general, click LEAF COLLECTION.)
Troy McCain, supervisor of Public Works’ Maintenance Division, said leaves are starting to fall with the cold weather but crews know they’ll be returning to some streets later in the year to finish the job.
“Our goal is to get all the leaves picked up by Christmas, both because of the holidays and because that’s about the time when we lose seasonal workers and when we convert trucks to snow and ice removal,” McCain said.
Residents can rake or blow leaves to the curb – not into the street – a day ahead of crews’ arrival. Leaf piles should be placed away from obstructions such as parked vehicles, fire hydrants, mailboxes, water meters, and landscaping. The piles should contain only loose leaves and no other yard waste.
City crews will do the work of piling up the leaves from the sidewalks.
“We really encourage residents to mark this on their calendars and follow this timeline,” McCain said. “We have a lot of leaves on a lot of streets and limited resources.”
The City will be doing preliminary leaf collection in the coming days to hit leaf-heavy areas, test out equipment, and train new workers.
The formal schedule runs through Dec. 21, but the City will do spot pick-up until Dec. 31. If there are particularly bad areas that were missed, residents can call (859) 292-2292 toward the end of the season to report those, although chances are crews already know about problem areas.
Crews will work only one side of the street at a time so residents can park on the other side (or around the block or in their driveways) and avoid getting a ticket. Watch for “No Parking” signs put up a business day beforehand, as well as sandwich-board signs in highly visible areas.
McCain has been on the leaf crew since 1995 and has supervised the effort for about five years. He said leaf collection both keeps the City looking cleaner and is an important part of routine maintenance that helps with storm water drainage by keeping gutters and storm sewers from getting clogged with debris.
“It’s not an exact science because of the weather, but we work hard to take care of our infrastructure,” he said.
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