Where to Off Your Christmas Tree

Christmas is over and if you’re looking for a place to drop off your live Christmas tree, there are two locations set up in town that will dispose of your trees free of charge.

Trees may be dropped off at the SAFE Recycling Center, located at 702 Warehouse Road, or at the Foster Communications Coliseum parking lot, located at 50 E 43rd Street.

Both locations will be open for drop off from Dec. 26 through Jan. 10, and drop offs may be made at any time.

“There’s going to be some orange barricade barrels set up and you just put your tree in that,” said City Operations Director Shane Kelton.

Kelton says trees must have all decorations, lights and tinsel removed before being dumped at the sites. The City will then put the trees in a wood chipper and recycle the chopped up bits.

“We take them and we compost them and let them sit,” Kelton said. “Pine is really bad if you don’t let it sit, [what we do] is almost like composting.”

Kelton says that once the tree chips have sit for long enough, they’ll be used around town on various projects, like for mulching trees in city parks.

“If you put fresh pine trees down it will really zap the nitrogen out of the ground,” Kelton says, explaining why the tree bits will have to sit.