Trash Museum

Visitors to the CRRA Trash Museum, located at 211 Murphy Road in Hartford's South Meadows, may tour the 6,500 square feet of educational exhibits beginning at the Temple of Trash. Learn about the problems of old-fashioned methods of disposal, such as the “town dump.”  From problems, the tour moves to solutions, including explanations of source reduction, recycling, trash-to-energy and landfills.

You can also see our new group of exhibits explaining the link between recycling and energy conservation and a series of works on climate change created by University of Hartford students. During the tour, watch our new single-stream recycling facility in operation. From the mezzanine viewing area -- and on our closed-circuit television system -- visitors can follow newspapers, cardboard, junk mail, bottles, cans and plastic containers from the tipping floor, through CRRA's state-of-the-art single-stream processing equipment and see them crushed or baled. Prepared recyclables are then shipped to markets and made into new products.

Back in the museum, a mural by Higganum artist Ted Esselstyn depicts the history of trash management from pre-historic times to today. You can also see the amount of trash one person made in an entire year at Sustainable Dave's exhibit. And don't forget to check out our unique line of sustainability-themed souvenirs in the Trash Museum Shop.