Garbage is a “hot” topic in the Armenian town ofKapan.

Many irate residents of one Building 8 in the Shinararner District say they can no longer tolerate the smell of rotting trash outside their building.

What’s happening is that residents of the nearby 7 buildings are all throwing their household trash in bins located in close proximity to the building. Residents say the odor is particularly bad in the warm summer months, attracting flies and mosquitoes.

This problem goes back many years. Residents of Building 8 have consistently asked that the dump site be removed from their vicinity.

According to the municipal services, the town has given the OK to move the dump site and is now negotiating with the building’s management board regarding a new location.

Local residents have gathered to discuss the matter and have come up with an equal number of alternatives.

Municipal Services Chief Armen Gevorgyan says his garbage trucks can’t drive up to the bins to collect the trash and cart it away.

Local residents have adopted a “Not in my backyard” approach. No one wants to see garbage bins in front of their building.

Thus, the issue remains up in the air with no resolution in sight.

There are 4 garbage trucks servicing the entire town ofKapan, with its 116 pick-up points.

Downtown districts get their garbage carted away almost daily. It’s the outlying neighborhoods that experience backlogs. Some areas on the fringes of town don’t even have garbage drops and residents dump their trash in convenient ravines and gullies.

When asked about the mounds of garbage that have accumulated here and there, many residents just shake their shoulders and reply that they have no where else to dump their trash.

Armen Gevorgyan responds that many outlying residents haven’t signed garbage disposal contracts with the town.

The main municipal trash dump is located 8 kilometers from the town. Household, construction and other types of trash all get thrown into the mix without any prior sorting.

Every day, 20-30 tons of waste is carted to the site. Nothing gets recycled so the mountains of garbage keep growing. It’s been that way since the dump started operating in the 1960s.

An elderly couple lives not far from the house.

Grandma Arevik and her husband make a living selling yoghurt, cheese and milk from the animals they keep.

The woman says that they are always careful not to let the cows wander off to the dump and feed on the grass there.

The trash problem has gotten so bad that the two local rivers, the Voghji and Vachagan, are used by residents to dump plastic bottles and bags and other assorted trash.

TheVachaganRiverhas been cleaned four times in the past 7 years. It’s now the turn for theVoghjiRiver.