Asheville Landfill, Dump & Recycling — Hours, Fees & What They Take
Asheville makes small loads cheap: the Buncombe County transfer station charges $2 per 33-gallon bag, or $1 for anything smaller. No scale, no minimum-tonnage maths. Three bags of household junk is six dollars. Appliances, car batteries, cardboard and textiles are free, and your first ten tires a year are free too.
The catch is that Buncombe splits the job across two sites with different rules — and the one thing you probably want to get rid of, an old TV, isn't accepted at the near one. Here's how it works.
Disposal sites in and around Asheville
Buncombe County Transfer Station
Transfer Station
Buncombe County Solid Waste — the in-town option
190 Hominy Creek Road, Asheville, NC 28806 Directions ↗
Household waste — $2 per 33-gallon bag; $1 for smaller bags
$12 minimum on loads under 380 lbs
Commercial / franchise haulers — $63.50/ton (double for loads over 5% cardboard or untreated wood)
Free for residents: white goods & appliances (stoves, fridges, A/C units, freezers, microwaves)
Free for residents: lead-acid batteries, cardboard, newspapers, textiles
Tires — first 10 free, then $2 each (including on rims)
Accepts: Household trash, Co-mingled recycling, Tires, White goods, Textiles, Cardboard
Does not take televisions — those go to the landfill (below). Payment by cash, check, Visa, Mastercard, Amex or Discover; tap-to-pay is not accepted, so bring a physical card.
Timing rule worth knowing: loads that need more than 30 minutes to unload must be inside the landfill by 4 p.m. on weekdays or noon on Saturday. The county's C&D unit shares the same Panther Branch Road site.
Both county sites open at 8:00 a.m. Monday to Friday and close at 4:30 p.m. On Saturday they diverge: the transfer station runs to 1:00 p.m., the landfill closes at 12:30 p.m. Both are shut Sunday.
The half-hour difference matters more than it sounds, because the landfill is the one that's twenty minutes out of town in Alexander. Aim for the transfer station on a Saturday unless you specifically need the landfill — and if you're hauling a TV, you do need the landfill, so leave earlier.
What it costs to dump in Asheville
Buncombe County's per-bag pricing is genuinely unusual and it's the single most useful thing to know here. Most counties weigh you, charge $40–$66 a ton, and apply a minimum of $10–$25 that makes a small trip uneconomic. Buncombe just counts bags: $2 for a 33-gallon, $1 for smaller.
For a typical household clean-out — five or six bags out of a garage — that's ten or twelve dollars, and you're done.
The $12 minimum kicks in on loads under 380 lbs, which is the threshold where bag-counting stops and weighing starts. Above that you're into per-ton territory, and the landfill charges residential trucks, vans and small trailers $53.50/ton with a $10 minimum.
What's free is where the real money is, and Buncombe is generous:
White goods — fridges, washers, dryers, stoves, freezers, microwaves, A/C units. Free. These are banned from NC landfills anyway, so this is the correct route and it costs nothing.
Lead-acid batteries, cardboard, newspapers, textiles — free for residents.
First 10 tires a year — free, then $2 each. Ten is a lot; most households never exceed it.
Electronics go to the landfill: $10 per TV, monitor or laptop, and $0.30 a pound for other electronics (limit five units).
So the smart Asheville run is: appliances, batteries, cardboard and tires to the transfer station for nothing, bagged household waste at $2 a bag, and screens to the landfill at $10 apiece. See what it costs to dump across North Carolina for how that compares.
Haul it yourself, or hire junk removal? — Asheville
At $2 a bag, hauling it yourself in Asheville is about as cheap as disposal gets in North Carolina — the constraint is your vehicle and your Saturday, not the gate fee. It stops working when the load stops being bag-shaped: a mattress, a sofa, a deck tear-out, a whole-house clear. Two options then:
Haul it yourself — cheapest by a long way if you have a vehicle and can lift it. The gate rates above are the whole cost.
Junk-removal crew — a crew does the loading and hauls it away — curbside and in-home collection are usually priced differently. Usually the better call for heavy furniture, appliances, or a cleanout on a deadline — and Asheville's steep driveways and older homes make the carry-out harder than most.
Not sure which is cheaper for your load? Check an upfront junk-removal price and weigh it against the gate fee — no obligation either way.
The transfer station charges $2 per 33-gallon bag, $1 for smaller, with a $12 minimum on loads under 380 lbs. The landfill charges residential vehicles $53.50/ton with a $10 minimum. Commercial haulers pay $63.50/ton.
What are the Buncombe County dump hours?
Transfer station (Hominy Creek Rd): Mon–Fri 8–4:30, Sat 8–1. Landfill (Panther Branch Rd): Mon–Fri 8–4:30, Sat 8–12:30. Loads needing over 30 minutes to unload must be inside by 4 p.m. weekdays or noon Saturday.
Can I drop off a TV in Asheville?
Not at the transfer station. TVs go to the landfill at 85 Panther Branch Road, $10 per TV, monitor or laptop, any size. Other electronics are $0.30 a pound, limit five units. Computers and TVs are banned from North Carolina landfills, so they're recycled.
What's free at the transfer station?
White goods and appliances (stoves, fridges, A/C, freezers, microwaves), lead-acid batteries, cardboard, newspapers and textiles — all free for residents. Plus your first 10 tires.
How many tires can I drop off free?
The first 10 are free. After that it's $2 per tire, and tires on rims are also $2 each.
Can I tap to pay?
No — the transfer station takes cash, check, Visa, Mastercard, Amex and Discover, but tap-to-pay is not accepted. Bring a physical card or cash.
