Dumpster, Porta Potty & Storage Container Rental in Northeast Philadelphia

The Airlite and the Shared Driveway

The Northeast's signature house is the airlite row, built by the thousands from the 1940s through the 1960s with a front lawn, a patio and a driveway that runs behind the block off a rear alley, shared with the neighbors. That rear drive is the best thing about renovating here and the thing to plan around. It's private property, so a box or a container parked in your section of it needs no Streets Department permit, only the L&I license that every dumpster in the city carries; but it's shared, and a roll-off box across the drive is a box every neighbor on the block has to steer around to reach their garage. The courtesy that keeps those jobs quiet is a box pulled tight to your own garage pad, a 10 or 20 rather than a 30, and a swap schedule that doesn't leave a full box there over a weekend. A porta potty fits beside the garage, out of the front lawn and off the sidewalk, reachable by the service truck from the alley.

The alley itself has limits. The rear drives were laid out for 1950s cars, and a roll-off truck that fits down one may not have room to raise its bed, which needs clear height and a straight run. On a block where the alley won't take it, the box goes in front, on the driveway apron or the lawn edge with mats under it, which is still private property and still permit-free. We look at the block on the map before we quote and send the driver to look when it's close.

The Boulevard and the Industrial Corridors

Roosevelt Boulevard is a state road, twelve lanes of it, and nothing sits in its right-of-way under any city permit; the shopping centers, dealers, restaurants and offices along it are parking-lot placements on a property manager's rules, with the box behind the building and the delivery timed before the lot fills. The same holds for Cottman, Frankford, Castor and Bustleton Avenues' commercial stretches. The Northeast's industrial corridors along State Road, the river and the rail lines, and the parks around the airport and Byberry, are the city's warehouse district: truck courts, gates that open before dawn, and roof replacements and tenant conversions that take a 40 yard box on swaps and a 48 foot container as the laydown yard. We deliver and swap on the facility's clock, usually first thing, and stage the box where the tenant's trucks won't have to steer around it.

Frankford's older rows and the blocks around the El are the Northeast's version of the rowhome problem: no driveway, a box in a parking space under the Streets Department's permit for the demolition days, and a porta potty on the sidewalk or inside the shell. The avenue under the El adds low clearance for a roll-off truck raising its bed, so on those blocks the box goes on a side street and the truck never tips under the tracks.

Pennypack, the Parks and the Parish Calendar

The Northeast has more park acreage than the rest of the city combined, and its event calendar runs through it: the runs and rides in Pennypack Park, the festivals and fairs at the recreation centers and the big parish and school carnivals that fill a parking lot for a weekend, the community days in Fox Chase and Somerton, the Mayfair and Tacony street events. Each needs units in clusters near the food and the stages, an accessible unit in every cluster on a path a wheelchair can use, hand wash stations by the food, and for a weekend carnival, a mid-event service so Sunday's units are as usable as Friday's. The parish lots have an advantage the parks don't: pavement and a gate, so the delivery is simple and the units can be set the day before. In the parks the service truck needs a route the Parks Department allows, and the units go where the path lets the truck reach them.

The Northeast's backyards are the other event ground: graduation parties, big family gatherings, a wedding under a tent on one of Somerton's half-acre lots. Those are a few units or a luxury restroom trailer set out of sight of the tent, reached through a driveway gate the delivery truck can clear. Our How Many Porta Potties Do I Need guide has the planning table; see events for the trailer and the event units.

Bustleton and Somerton: The Biggest Lots in the City

The Far Northeast is the part of Philadelphia that looks like the suburbs, and the jobs there work like Bucks County's: half-acre lots in Somerton, big singles in Bustleton with driveways long enough for a 30 yard box and a car, in-law suites going on the back, pools going in the yard, and whole-house renovations with a crew for months. Everything sits on private property, the L&I license on the box and nothing from the Streets Department, and the planning question is the approach: a curved driveway under old trees, a gate the truck can't clear, lawn the box's corner would crush. A 20 foot container beside the garage holds the millwork and fixtures for a long job, and the porta potty goes behind the house, out of the neighbors' sight.

The one thing the Far Northeast adds is the commercial corridor along Bustleton Avenue and the office parks near the airport and Byberry, which run on a property manager's rules and a state road's shoulder that nothing sits on. A fit-out there is a lot placement behind the building, timed before the lot fills; a warehouse roof near the airport is a 40 on swaps in the truck court at the hours the tenant sets. Our Bensalem & Lower Bucks page covers the same kind of site a mile across the county line.

Sources

• City of Philadelphia: Get a Dumpster License (Private or Right-of-Way)
• City of Philadelphia: Apply for a Temporary No Parking (TNP) Permit

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Nearby Service Areas

• Germantown, Mt. Airy & Chestnut Hill
• Fishtown & Kensington