Garco Construction Inc., of Spokane, has been awarded a $1 million contract to construct a new garbage-transfer station for Benewah County, Idaho.

J. Michele Reynolds, the Benewah County clerk, says the county has started site preparation for the facility, which will be located about two miles southeast of St. Maries. It will be located on the same property as the current waste-transfer facility. The new transfer station will be paid for with money from a voter-approved bond for $1.7 million.

Reynolds says the Idaho state Department of Environmental Quality is requiring the county to build a new transfer station because the current facility no longer complies with Idaho's municipal solid waste rules.

Philip Boyd, president and principal engineer of Welch Comer Engineers Inc., in Coeur d'Alene, says the current facility doesn't meet standards because it doesn't have an impermeable tipping floor, which is where garbage is dumped before being loaded into transfer trailers and hauled to Missoula, Mont., where it is placed in a landfill.

Also, the current facility isn't covered, so it allows water to be absorbed into the garbage, which increases hauling costs and increases the potential for leaching of contaminants from the garbage into the ground, he says. Boyd serves as the county's engineer, and Welch Comer did the site design and permitting for the project, he says.

Garco should start work on the project this month and complete it by early next spring, Boyd says.

The new transfer station will have a concrete foundation and tipping floor that will be impermeable, Boyd says. It will be housed in a steel building, he says. The structure will have 12,600 square feet of floor space, with 8,300 square feet used by the new tipping floor and 3,000 square feet used for the transfer truck and trailer loading area. The remaining space will be used for office and maintenance area, Boyd says. The transfer floor will be about 16 feet below the tipping floor and will be able to accommodate two 53-foot transfer trailers, he says.

The current transfer station is the county's only such facility, and will remain open while the new one is constructed on the same property, he says. The current facility has a 4,500-square-foot tipping floor and is enclosed by a fence.

The new transfer station will have more capacity, Boyd says. The county currently processes about 20 tons of garbage per day, and the new facility is designed to accommodate up to 42 tons of garbage per day, which gives the facility an estimated life of 25 years, he says. The project architect is H2A Architects PA, of Coeur d'Alene, Boyd says.