Charlottesville, VA Trash & Recycling: Recycling Requirements (2026)

Section 26-3 defines 'recyclable materials' for Charlottesville's program as all glass containers, aluminum cans, newspapers, cardboard, mixed paper, magazines and catalogs, plastic soft drink bottles and milk or water jugs made of #1 and #2 plastic, and steel or tin cans used for fruit, vegetables, soup or pet food, plus any other item the Director of Public Works later designates. Section 26-46 makes participation voluntary: any curbside customer, defined as someone who lives or runs a business in the city and receives curbside refuse service, may join the citywide residential recycling program simply by collecting those materials and setting them out in a city-provided recycling container in the same spot and on the same day trash is placed for pickup.

Recycling containers must then be removed from the curb the same way refuse containers are under § 26-30's placement and removal timing. The city council's stated purpose for the article, in § 26-45, is reducing the solid waste stream and its disposal costs and helping meet a state-mandated 25 percent waste-reduction target referenced in § 26-60. The Director of Public Works can add further rules to run the program under § 26-50. Because recycling is voluntary rather than mandatory, a resident who declines to participate faces no penalty, but anyone who does opt in must still follow the material list and container placement rules that come with it.