Court decision leads to changes at city landfill

Jeremy Deutsch - Kamloops This Week Published: December 10, 2009

Residents using the Mission Flats landfill will notice some lofty changes in they way they can dump their trash. In the wake of a precedent-setting lawsuit, the city has installed a waist-high railing to the edge of the tipping platform. It has also extended the concrete slab so people can't bring their vehicles as close to the edge of the bin as they once could. Earlier this year, a court found The City of Kamloops and Stantec Consulting Ltd., the engineers who designed the landfill, at fault for an accident back in October 2006. Rod Lovely lost his balance from a platform at the landfill, falling two-and-a-half metres. The 53-year-old Kamloops resident broke both his legs in the fall, later resulting in one of his legs being amputated. Lovely was awarded more than $1 million in damages.

The city was found 55 per cent at fault in the accident, while Stantec was 35 per cent to blame. Jim McNeely, streets and internal services manager, said the city always felt the landfill was safe enough, but the changes will heighten the awareness of a potential hazard. "And, hopefully, no more accidents like that ever occur," he said. The changes, which cost less than $20,000 to complete, were installed a couple of weeks ago. The city intends to make similar upgrades to its yard-waste sites in the coming months. The new design is getting a thumbs-up from the lawyer who fought on Lovely's behalf. John Hogg said the changes are good and believes the upgrades would have prevented the accident in the first place. "It's so easy to fix," he said. He even suggested just putting up the 42-inch railing would probably be enough. He called the incident "a wake-up call" and noted the case has prompted cities across the country to look at their landfill designs. "If it does good, everybody is happy," he said. As for the city, it will continue to monitor the landfill, but McNeely said early reports indicate changes are not impeding anybody from using the site.