HOUSTON – Everywhere you drive around Houston you can still see tree limbs and branches piled up along streets and curbs. Five weeks have passed since Hurricane Beryl blew through the area taking down thousands of trees. Some of you are asking when the city of Houston will finish the job of getting it all cleaned up. KPRC 2 Investigator Amy Davis is getting answers to your questions.
Viewer Jayne Look asked: “When will all of the Hurricane Beryl debris be removed from the sides of the road and from the esplanades of Chimney Rock and also Stella Link Boulevard?”
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We referred Jayne to the City of Houston debris tracker. If you have a lot of debris on your street or in your area you can search by a specific address to see the city’s progress in removing it.
Yellow areas indicate neighborhoods where crews are currently collecting the first pass.
Green areas indicate neighborhoods where the first pass of storm debris collection is complete.
Gray areas indicate neighborhoods in the queue for collection that will be assigned as soon as crews are available.
When the first pass is complete for the entire city, a solid waste spokesperson told KPRC 2 the city will do a second pass. He says the city is about 75% complete with that first pass.
The City of Houston contracted with three disaster debris companies for storm debris removal. Council approved spending $120-million for the project but solid waste didn’t say how much has actually been paid to date.
Why did debris clean-up crews just skip my street?
Some of you are telling us that it looks like the city has forgotten about your street and that you are still waiting for the first truck to come by.
We drove down the 8600 of Bob White in Southwest Houston Tuesday, August 13th. The debris tracker shows the first pass in this area is in progress.
This is actually what the area looks like right now.
Solid Waste says you can report your storm debris to 3-1-1 but it’s not required. They say storm debris contractors will be driving down every public road collecting storm debris for the entire city.
Reasons clean-up crews might skip your debris pile
Random junk is in the pile
There are other reasons your debris pile pickup might be delayed.
We noticed some of the current piles of debris also have other trash like furniture and fence posts. The city says they will not pick up debris piles that also have other trash mixed in. This is a job for two separate hired crews. So, if you still have a debris pile and see other items in that pile, try to pull out those items and place in a different pile.
Too many cars parked on the street near debris
One viewer who lives in Kingwood told us clean-up crews had to skip their street because too many people were parked on the street too close to debris piles. Someone from the crew did knock on doors to ask people to move. If you still have debris it might be a good idea to park far away from it so crews can get access to the piles.
Last month the City of Houston sent out best practices for debris removal.
*You can search your address in the debris tracker.
RELATED: Why it could still take weeks to remove Beryl debris in parts of Harris County
