S.F.'s quest for a better trash can was plagued by high costs. Will this time be different?

San Francisco Chronicle​

01-07-2025

San Francisco nearly gave up trying to replace its troublesome old public trash cans last year with sleek, custom-designed receptacles, amid questions over their cost. Now the effort has come back to life.
In 2018, the city asked industrial design firms to create three prototypes, of which the 'Slim Silhouette' design won out, a sleek silver can with two circular openings, one for trash, the other for recycling. Gordon said the design has since been tweaked after a trial run of the cans last year.
The Department of Public Works hopes to have the new cans on the street within a year, but maybe sooner, she said.
The development is a step forward after uncertainty over the new trash cans' future. Last year, San Francisco's quest for a new modern trash can all but died. After spending more than half a million dollars on prototypes for a new bespoke disposal bin for the city, a lack of funding forced DPW to put its replacement project on hold.
Gordon said DPW has been working to ensure that any chosen vendor can handle the mass production of about 3,000 cans while staying within the budget. That might be difficult in a city notorious for delays and cost overruns.
The goal is to find a manufacturer to produce the order at $3,000 per can, which Gordon said is on par with sturdy off-the-shelf models.
Once a manufacturer is selected and starts building the cans, Gordon said DPW plans to start a pilot program to set up a few new trash cans in certain parts of the city quickly while the department waits for the rest.
'We want to put out a limited number right away to test them, to see if they're working,' she said. 'Once we have contact with a manufacturer, we're hopeful it will fall within our planned budget.'
The city is currently still using green cans from the 1990s, but they are plagued with issues and they often make street corners dirtier because of scavengers. The cans have been criticized for not working as intended, with non-trash items intermixing with garbage because of a faulty recycling compartment.
The updated trash cans will include a strengthened locking mechanism and be built from materials that make it easier to remove graffiti and tags. In response to frequent concerns about people digging through city trash, the new models are also designed to be more secure.
'Harder to rummage through — all things we've heard for years,' Gordon said.
Some residents have called on the city to simply purchase commercial Bigbelly trash cans, already used in some areas. But Gordon noted that community benefit districts have been pulling those out due to ongoing maintenance costs.
But that's not all that has upset some residents and critics of the department. When DPW embarked on finding new cans, the city was criticized for its decision to design its own instead of buying an off-the-shelf model.
For example, the new cans will have openings large enough for small pizza boxes to go through, but they are also tamper-proof and will be easier to clean and service.
Later in 2021, the city revealed that the cost of each custom prototype ranges from $11,000 to $20,000, sparking public outcry and national headlines. The city emphasized that these were not the final production costs, but design and testing prototypes — a standard practice in product development.
The idea of spending that much on new trash cans, even temporarily, became a political flashpoint and prompted then-Supervisor Matt Haney and others to call on the city to buy pre-existing models, but the department has decided to continue its project.
The timeline remains fluid in terms of when the city will get its new trash cans. But city officials are optimistic.
'It's a very long contracting process, and we know we have to get in the queue with other procurements they're doing citywide,' she said. 'But once we have contact with a manufacturer, we're hopeful it will fall within our planned budget.'