Purple Bin Glass Recycling Now Available At Burke Centre VRE Station

BURKE, VA — The Fairfax County Department of Public Works and Environmental Services' Solid Waste program installed a new purple bin last week in the parking lot of the Burke Center VRE station.

Purple bins are glass-specific receptacles for recycling services not provided by general mixed recycling at the curbside in Fairfax County.

“Shortly after being sworn in 2020, I noticed that there were some parts of the Braddock District lacking convenient access to our Purple Bin glass recycling program,” Braddock District Supervisor James Walkinshaw said in a statement. “While the pandemic created some delays, we've been working hard to correct that.”

As of Oct. 1, 2019, Fairfax County stopped accepting glass bottles and jars in its curbside recycling program. For single-stream recycling, glass creates many problems. It’s heavy, can contain contaminants, and is expensive to transport.

Glass collected in the purple containers is crushed and reused locally for county projects, an option that avoids the emissions associated with long-distance transport of glass for landfilling or recycling, Walkinshaw said.