These two sit at opposite ends of the Highway 50 corridor and share the same problem: neither has a recycling centre of its own, and the free green waste bins in the neighbouring towns don't cover you. Here's what you actually get, and where it runs out.
El Dorado Disposal runs satellite recycling centres in El Dorado Hills, Cameron Park and Placerville. There isn't one in Shingle Springs, and there isn't one in Pollock Pines. Whatever you're getting rid of, the nearest option is either a neighbouring town's centre or the main facility at Diamond Springs. That single fact shapes everything else on this page, and it's the reason the corridor calls a hauler more often per household than the towns with their own centres do.
This is the one that genuinely catches people. The two-cubic-yard daily green waste bins at Cameron Park and El Dorado Hills are restricted to residents of those Community Services Districts. A Shingle Springs address is not a Cameron Park CSD address, however close the two look on a map. So driving your brush to Saratoga Lane because a neighbour told you it's free is a wasted trip. Same applies in reverse for Pollock Pines. You're on the voucher system instead.
Both towns sit in El Dorado Disposal's Franchise Area A, billed every two months. Residential customers get an annual green waste voucher — one toward kerbside collection and one toward a free load at the Diamond Springs facility — plus two free bulky item pickups a year and free spring and autumn yard waste collection. The published voucher amount differs by area and the county's own documents disagree with each other on the figure, so call El Dorado Disposal on (530) 626-4141 and ask what yours actually covers rather than trusting a number off a website, including this one. Bulky items have to be under 100 pounds and under eight feet, and you need to confirm the date before putting anything at the kerb.
The El Dorado Disposal Materials Recovery Facility is at 4100 Throwita Way in Diamond Springs. From Shingle Springs that's roughly 7 miles and about 14 minutes — short enough that self-hauling a small load is reasonable. From Pollock Pines it's about 17 miles and 25 minutes, which the county describes as the eastern end of the franchise corridor. Minimum load charge is $24.53, mixed loose waste $27.06 a yard, and recycling, all e-waste and scrap metal are free. Distances are approximate and worth checking against your own address.
County ordinance adds a 25% surcharge to any unsecured load arriving at the facility. Properly secured, not a tarp thrown loosely over the top. Brush is exactly the load that fails it, and a truck bed of manzanita coming down the hill from Pollock Pines is the classic case. Everything that leaves in my trailer goes out tarped and strapped, and that's part of what you're paying for.
Furniture and mattresses, appliances including fridges and water heaters, televisions and computers, garage and household clutter, brush and yard waste, stumps and old fencing, construction and remodel debris, exercise equipment, and scrap metal. Rural properties along this corridor tend to generate the awkward stuff — wire fencing, sheds that have collapsed, decades of things stored in outbuildings. None of it needs to be at the road first. What I can't take is hazardous: paint, solvents, fuel, pool chemicals, asbestos. No junk removal service in California legally can.
By the cubic yard — the space it takes up in the trailer — with a $165 minimum on any trip. Not per item, which matters more out here than in town: if I'm already coming up a long driveway, adding the second pile costs far less than a second visit. Distance affects the quote, so give me your location along with a list or a couple of photos. Firm total before anything is loaded, and it doesn't move once I've started.
For properties along this corridor this is the single most valuable free service going, and it exists precisely because of where you live. The El Dorado County Fire Safe Council runs a free chipping program across the western slope, funded by CAL FIRE and county air quality grants: two free services a year per address, renewing 1 January, up to six hours of chipping per visit. Brush only, seven inches diameter or under, no rocks, dirt, wire, lumber, poison oak or bamboo, stacked next to a driveway or road, primary residences only. Renters need a landlord consent form. Nothing runs on Red Flag days. Apply through edcfiresafe.org. Six hours of chipping is a genuinely large amount of defensible space work done for nothing.
El Dorado County residents drop household hazardous waste free at the Diamond Springs facility — Friday, Saturday and Sunday only, 9am to 4pm, closed between noon and one. Different gate and different hours from the regular tip, so a weekday run with a boot full of paint cans won't work. Charges apply to business waste. Rural outbuildings tend to hide a lot of this: old fuel cans, pesticide, treatment chemicals. Sort it out for one weekend trip and call me for everything else.
Book the free chipping for brush under seven inches. Use your annual voucher and your two bulky pickups. Save chemicals for a weekend run to Diamond Springs. From Shingle Springs, a single small load is a short enough drive to be worth doing yourself. Where that stops: stumps, fencing, treated lumber and anything with wire or nails, which no chipper will take; appliances and anything heavy that has to come out of an outbuilding or down a slope; a load needing more than one run, which from Pollock Pines is most of an afternoon; a full property clearance; and anything that has to be gone by a fixed date. My minimum is $165 and pricing is by the cubic yard.
Compiled 15 September 2026 from El Dorado Disposal's residential, recycling centre and facility pages, El Dorado County's solid waste franchise and household hazardous waste listings, and the El Dorado County Fire Safe Council. Driving distances are approximate and taken from open mapping data rather than an official source. Hours, fees and allowances change, so call ahead. If something here has gone out of date, tell me and I'll correct it.
Send a photo and your location along the corridor and I'll give you a firm total before anything is loaded.
