Virginia trash pickup is run by cities, counties and private haulers, not by the state.
Your pickup day comes from your city’s or hauler’s own lookup. Among the largest cities, Virginia Beach, Chesapeake and Norfolk collect curbside themselves. Virginia has an electronics recycling law, but no statewide bottle deposit, PaintCare paint or mattress program.
Find your city
- Falls Church — City of Falls Church Department of Public Works, with American Disposal Services: gray trash, green recycling and yellow organics carts every Wednesday, and a solid waste fee on the real estate tax bill.
Other large cities and their official collection pages:
- Virginia Beach: City of Virginia Beach Public Works, Waste Management Group. Curbside services are weekly trash collection, every-other-week recycling collection and weekly yard debris collection, with carts at the curb no later than 6 a.m. on the collection day. Official page ↗
- Chesapeake: City of Chesapeake Public Works Department, Waste Management Division. The Waste Management Division collects refuse once every week for more than 72,000 residences, and beginning July 27, 2026 residents place all household waste including recyclables in one bin for sorting at SPSA’s advanced processing facility in Portsmouth. Official page ↗
- Norfolk: City of Norfolk Department of Public Works, Division of Waste Management. Curbside recycling is collected every other week on the same day as trash collection, and household trash, recycling, bulk waste, yard waste and tires are all collected at the curb. Official page ↗ Look up your collection day ↗
Missing your city? Suggest a City.
Who collects in Virginia
- Recycling is run locally: each county, city, town or regional authority must maintain a recycling program meeting a minimum rate of 15% or 25% depending on population density and unemployment. Source ↗
- DEQ says your local government website or recycling coordinator is the best source for recycling details and special collection events, including hard-to-dispose items like electronics and tires. Source ↗
National haulers (Republic Services, WM, Waste Connections) hold contracts in many places; the city or county names the hauler for each street.
State-level rules
- Container deposit: No statewide container deposit law. An October 2024 Connecticut Office of Legislative Research issue brief names all ten bottle bill states (California, Connecticut, Hawaii, Iowa, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, New York, Oregon and Vermont), and Virginia is not among them. Source ↗
- Paint: Not a PaintCare state. PaintCare lists the twelve states plus the District of Columbia where it operates, and Virginia is not among them. Leftover paint goes through the local household hazardous waste program; see paint. Source ↗
- Mattresses: No statewide mattress take-back program. The Mattress Recycling Council says its Bye Bye Mattress program operates statewide only in California, Connecticut, Oregon and Rhode Island, so Virginia has no state mattress stewardship program. See mattresses. Source ↗
- Electronics: Virginia’s Computer Recovery and Recycling Act requires computer manufacturers selling more than 500 units in Virginia to file a recovery plan with DEQ and take their computer equipment back at no charge to the consumer; DEQ’s page describes no statewide landfill ban. Source ↗
State agency
- State agency: Virginia Department of Environmental Quality - Division of Land Protection and Revitalization (Solid Waste Program). It regulates the storage, treatment and disposal of solid waste through permits and inspections, and administers solid waste planning and recycling, tracking whether local planning units meet the state’s mandated recycling rates. Official website ↗
- Find your local program: Find your locality’s recycling program manager ↗
Flag of Virginia. Public-domain artwork. Artwork: LadyofHats with additional editing by 痛 and Patrickneil / Charles Keck. Source. Resized to 480 pixels wide.
Materials with their own rules
Paint · Lithium-ion batteries · Household hazardous waste · Mattresses · Pizza boxes · Christmas trees
Neighboring states
Kentucky · Maryland · North Carolina · Tennessee · West Virginia · Washington, DC
Sources
Official pages used: deq.virginia.gov · deq.virginia.gov · deq.virginia.gov · pw.virginiabeach.gov · pw.virginiabeach.gov · cityofchesapeake.net · cityofchesapeake.net · norfolk.gov · norfolk.gov · norfolk.gov · cga.ct.gov · paintcare.org · mattressrecyclingcouncil.org · deq.virginia.gov · deq.virginia.gov.
Back to all states.