O Tannenbaum, it’s time for your next life

It’s easy to find Christmas carols suitable for trimming the tree, but it’s tough to find any music that seems right for taking down those suckers.

There’s nothing festive about the chore. Granted, as garbage goes, the fragrance is hard to top, but nobody’s whistling “Deck the Halls” as those sappy, needle-shedding spruces and firs are lugged curbside.

But for the past several years, the city of Pittsburgh has offered the chance for them to be something more than trash. Drop off your tree to one of a dozen places in the next four weeks and the city will grind it into mulch sometime before spring. Allegheny County is offering the same deal through Jan. 14 at all nine regional parks.

Last winter, the city pulled in more than 2,000 trees. They weighed in at roughly 21 tons, and about 400 city residents walked away with free mulch when the city held four giveaway days in March and April.

This year, the city ought to be able to top that. The U.S. Census estimates there are more than 136,000 households in the city of Pittsburgh. If even one in 10 has a live Christmas tree, more than 13,000 trees could be culled. But two things have to happen before most people change their post-holiday tradition of putting trees out with the trash.

• People need to know where the drop-off sites are. (They’re listed later in this column.)

• People have to be persuaded it’s worth the effort, because it’s a pain in the Tannenbaum moving trees around.

I should acknowledge I have something of a founder’s interest in this effort. Three Christmases ago, Diana Ames of Friendship proposed a pilot project to drop trees in a little triangular parklet on Roup Avenue, behind the Aldi store on Baum Boulevard. Ms. Ames had seen that done in Munich.

Mike Gable, the city’s public works director, made arrangements to pick up the trees only days after I relayed the idea to him. The city picked up 215 trees in mid-January 2017, about two or three times what was expected.

The following Christmas, the North Side challenged the East End to a tree-toting contest — and got beat like we were the Little Drummer Boy’s target, pa rum pum pum-pum. Highland Park Girl Scout troops 55286 and 52498 won the first Pine Cone Derby trophy because they led the city as it hauled in an estimated 9.1 tons o’ tree.

The city more than doubled the tonnage last year, and would love to double that again, adding two more drop-off points.The savings to taxpayers by not sending these trees to the landfills amounts to little more than a fiscal stocking-stuffer; landfill costs are in the neighborhood of $28 a ton. There are also savings on fuel and labor by not hauling trees to landfills outside the city, but you’d still be lucky for this to be a wash once the costs of the dedicated tree pickups are figured in.

It’s still worthwhile for this reason alone: Trees aren’t trash. Put them, or any organic material, in an anaerobic landfill and that creates more methane. That’s a more potent greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide. So it’s mulch better — see what I did there? — to let trees keep giving. The city touts pine mulch as “great for vegetable gardens, blueberries, strawberry patches, tomatoes, and eradicating weeds.”

These nine drop-off sites are accessible for the entire month, 24 hours a day: Friendship (ZIP code 15232), Baum Grove Parklet, 400 Roup Ave. (off Fairmont Avenue); Deutschtown (15212), Sue Murray Swimming Pool Parking Lot, Cedar and Stockton avenues; Brookline (15226), Brookline Recreation Center, 1400 Oakridge Street; Brighton Heights (15212), Jack Stack Parking Lot, 600 Brighton Woods Road; Squirrel Hill South (15217), Prospect Drive roundabout in Schenley Park; Highland Park volleyball court parking lot, (15206) 151 Lake Drive; Oakwood Park ball field (15205), Noblestown Road; Southside Riverfront Park lower parking lot (15203); Middle Hill (15213), Kennard Park at Kirkpatrick and Reed streets.

Also ready to receive trees — but only from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. Monday through Saturday — are the city’s three year-round yard debris receiving sites: Hazelwood (15207), 3rd Division Public Works Department facility, Melanchton Avenue, off 5200 block of Second Avenue; Homewood West (15208), 2nd Division Public Works

Department facility, North Dallas Avenue at Hamilton Avenue; and Elliott (15220), 5th Division Public Works Department facility, 1330 Hassler Street off Herschel and Steuben streets.

Need a map? Go to https://pittsburghpa.gov/ dpw/xmas-tree-recycling. Or call 311 for more information.

County residents can drop trees through Jan. 14 at all nine regional parks from 8 a.m. until dusk: Boyce Park soccer fields parking lot; Deer Lakes Park Veterans Shelter parking lot; Harrison Hills Park parking lot at intersection of Chipmunk Drive and Cottontail Drive; Hartwood Acres Park Mansion parking lot; North Park swimming pool parking lot; Round Hill Park Alfalfa Shelter parking lot; Settlers Cabin Park wave pool parking lot; South Park wave pool parking lot; and White Oak Park Chestnut Shelter parking lot.

The county has been doing this at least 10 years, and last year it received and recycled about 3,500 trees. It uses the mulch throughout the park system’s 12,000 acres.

The Diocese of Pittsburgh is encouraging its parishioners to consider this option. “This is a wonderful way to show care for the creation that God has entrusted to us, by recycling the trees that have been such a beautiful symbol of light and salvation this Christmas season,” said Ellen Mady, spokesperson for the diocese.

Whether you’re headed to a church or a coffee shop this morning, spread the word: Mulch beats methane.