New solid waste transfer station opens in Hovland serving the East End
On Saturday, Aug. 9, the East End of Cook County celebrated expanded services with an open house for its new solid waste transfer station in Hovland.
The event was hosted by County Commissioner Deb White and North Shore Waste. WTIP attended the event and spoke with North Shore Waste Co-owner Dustin Hanson about the project and how the public will use the new facility, located on North Rd.
According to Hanson, the company has learned several lessons about how to lay out the transfer station to improve the public’s experience.
“We learned, working in a tight space for many years in Grand Marais, that laying out the facility here, where it’s a little more spread out. It gives people the ability to drive in and drive out through a loop,” Hanson said. “One new thing that’s added at this location is when you pull in, you pay for the product right through a window, kind of like you’re going to McDonald’s, Burger King, or something like that.”
Hanson explained the significance of identifying the containers for various waste with specific colors, noting, “Demolition goes in the yellow roll off, then scrap metal goes on the red roll offs, and recycling goes in the green trailers, and household garbage goes in the dumpsters. So when people come to the window, we can easily explain to them, hey, this is how you get rid of your product or your material, and this is where you go.”
The ongoing development of solid waste services in Cook County is unique in that it is a complex financial undertaking marked by collaboration between public services and private enterprise.
Rena Rogers, an active consultant for the project, said during the open house that the transfer station is an investment by the county government for the taxpayers of Cook County’s East End. “This is county land, county bonding paid for this. It will be paid on the solid waste fee that people, homeowners, will see. And people in Hovland would have been paying into that. And now they have some benefit for that themselves, too.”
She went on to explain that the private component of the partnership is noted in North Shore Waste’s agreement with the county to “be the ones that manage that and manage all of these together for a total solution for waste management in Cook County for the next hundred years.” When Roger’s refers to “all of these together”, she is referring to the transfer station in Tofte and the primary hub in Grand Marais, which is undergoing construction of a new indoor facility. Learn more about the North Shore Waste expansion plans project here.
As co-host of the event, Commissioner White shared a message with WTIP for the people she represents, stating, “For those of you in District One, we matter. We also now have another place to be social with one another, since we’re usually not.”
She went on to describe the transfer station as “a good investment for our community and the reason it’s out here, just like there’s going to be an upgraded one in the West End, is because the value of all county residents has been identified and talked about. So that’s why this is happening.”
Audio coverage of the event can be found below, along with a video featuring Hanson’s description of the new facility.
M Baxley August 12, 2025
