Two Langleys, two garbage schedules, two sets of rules
A short list of the things a Langley resident has to look up twice, starting with which day the bins go out.
Here is a game you can play with a new neighbour. Ask them what day garbage goes out. Then ask them which Langley they live in. About half the time, the second question takes longer.
We have two municipalities with the same name, side by side, and each runs its own curbside collection with its own calendar, its own contractors, its own bins and its own rules about where the wheels point. None of this is anyone’s fault. The City left the Township in 1955 and both have been doing their own thing ever since. It is just that “I live in Langley” is the least useful sentence you can say to a search engine.
So, a partial list of things a Langley resident looks up twice:
- Which day. Township addresses go into the Collection Calendar. City addresses open a PDF schedule from the City’s garbage page. Different tools, different answers, same street name.
- Which bin. The Township does garbage carts and Green Carts, with recycling in blue boxes, grey boxes and yellow bags. The City moved single-family homes to a cart program in 2025: one 240-litre garbage cart and one 240-litre organics cart.
- Which rules. Both say carts at the curb by 7:30 am. The Township asks that you not put garbage out before 8 pm the night before. The City wants the wheels facing the house, a metre of clearance and the lids closed. Get these backwards and you have simply memorised the wrong municipality.
- Who to call. Township questions go to [email protected]. City garbage and organics are collected by one contractor and recycling by another, and the City’s page gives both numbers. Call the wrong one and you get a polite person who cannot help you.
- Whether there is an app. The Township offers email, text or voice reminders through Recycle Coach, plus a mobile app. The City’s page does not mention one.
And that is just garbage. Repeat for dog licences, parking tickets, rec-centre registration, council meetings and which bylaw officer to grumble to about the hedge. Fort Langley, famously, is in the Township. The downtown is the City. The boundary runs through places where people genuinely cannot tell you which side their driveway is on.
The one bit of mercy: both municipalities collect on statutory holidays as normal, except January 1 and December 25, when pickup moves one day later. Hold on to that. It is the only rule you only have to learn once.
What would fix it
Nobody is merging two cities to save us a Google search. But a shared landing page would do most of the work: one address box, both municipalities behind it, and it tells you which Langley you are in and hands you the right calendar, bin rules and phone number. The address data exists. The boundary is public. It is a weekend project for a GIS person. In the meantime, we have done the dumb-but-useful version by hand.
Where to act
Our garbage, organics and recycling page puts both sets of rules, both schedules and both contacts on one screen, with links to the official pages. If you are not sure which Langley you live in, start with City vs. Township. Spotted a change in the rules? Tell us and we will update it.