Richland Faces A Giant Tire Dilemma On Twin Bridges Road

It's going to cost somewhere between $1.1 million to $1.6 million to clean it up. A giant tire pile located on Twin Bridges Rd. And It's big, approximately 7100 tons of tires. 

According to seattletimes.com,
‘The tire pile on Twin Bridges Road is easily the largest stockpile of old tires on an unlicensed site in Washington, according to a 2023 Washington Department of Ecology report.’ 

The property that this giant five-acre eyesore sits on was originally purchased by Beneficial Reuse Solutions LLC, of Juneau, Alaska back in 2008. The City of Richland took the company to court in 2023. In 2024, the city of Richland received a court order that would allow them to “abate” the nuisance, but somebody must pay for it. 

Why can't we fix this?

Washington State Department of Ecology certainly can't afford to do it. They receive approximately $600,000 a year for all their old tire removal programs statewide. 

In 2025, the state legislature decided to increase the fee charged to tire purchasers up to $5, which would generate approximately $2,000,000 per year, but the legislature only allocated $600,000 for the purpose of removing discarded tires. 

Can we re-cycle?

Is there no way to repurpose these tires for any other job? They're worn out, they're useless, and they pollute. There are some technologies out there that would grind up old tires and then repurpose the material. 

Rubberized asphalt might be one of the possible cures for this problem. 1 kilometer of new road can use up to 10,000 old tires. 

Meanwhile, with this mess there is very little funding to manage it and no funding to remove it. 

According to msn.com,
‘The tire pile near the Horn Rapids housing development and south of the Hanford nuclear reservation is one of four exceptionally difficult properties Richland is working on. Kintzley said the other three are homes.
Each is challenging, but Twin Bridges is particularly thorny.’ 

This is a huge problem and it's not going to go away by itself. Here's hoping we can find a solution in the next few years.