Dump guide

San Diego County dumps: all 12 landfills and transfer stations (2026)

By The Haul Boys · October 12, 2026 · 8 min read

San Diego County runs twelve public dumps: four landfills where your load goes straight into the ground, and eight transfer stations where it gets weighed, sorted and trucked out to a landfill elsewhere. There is no single county page that lists all twelve with an address, a phone number and the one closest to your house. Here it is, verified against the county's own facility map and each operator's listing on October 12, 2026. We have full fee-and-hours guides live for four of the twelve; the rest are linked here the day each one ships.

The full list

Every facility on the San Diego County Department of Public Works' official landfill and transfer station map, plus the two we have double-checked directly against the city map's own address data (Otay and the EDCO sites). Drive times are off-peak estimates from Carlsbad, our home turf in North County.

Sources disagree on a few of the unverified phone numbers below (noted in the Sources paragraph). Call before a special trip, especially for the eight without a published guide yet.

Which dump is closest to you

Match your city to the facility that serves it. If two are close, we picked the one with the shorter drive for a typical address in that city.

• North County coast and inland (Carlsbad, Oceanside, Vista, San Marcos, Encinitas, Solana Beach, Del Mar, Rancho Santa Fe): Palomar Transfer Station, Carlsbad.
• North County east (Escondido, Valley Center, Rancho Bernardo, 4S Ranch): Escondido Resource Recovery.
• Fallbrook, Bonsall, Camp Pendleton: Fallbrook Transfer Station.
• Ramona, Julian, east Poway: Ramona Transfer Station.
• Central San Diego (Mira Mesa, Kearny Mesa, Clairemont, UTC, La Jolla, Rancho Peñasquitos, west Poway): Miramar Landfill.
• Downtown, Barrio Logan, Point Loma, Coronado: EDCO Recycling & Transfer on Dalbergia Street.
• East County (Santee, Lakeside, Mission Trails, Tierrasanta): Sycamore Landfill.
• El Cajon, Alpine, Rancho San Diego: WM Refuse & Recycling, El Cajon.
• La Mesa, Spring Valley, College Area, SDSU: EDCO Station, La Mesa.
• Lemon Grove, Encanto, Paradise Hills: SANCO Resource Recovery.
• South Bay (National City, Chula Vista, Imperial Beach, Bonita, Eastlake, Otay Ranch): Otay Landfill.
• Borrego Springs and Anza-Borrego: Borrego Landfill. It is the only facility out there, and the nearest alternative is Ramona, well over an hour away.

What's free at almost every facility

Most of these dumps give something away for free to residents who show ID matching the drop-off address: green waste and clean wood at Miramar, mulch and up to 10 mattresses per visit at Ramona, and e-waste or scrap metal recycling at several of the EDCO sites. None of it is universal and none of it is cash in your pocket if you have to rent a truck to get there. Our mattress disposal guide covers the free options in detail for the facilities we have verified.

Landfill or transfer station: does it matter to you

Not much, practically. A landfill buries your load where it lands; a transfer station weighs it, sorts out anything recyclable or hazardous, and trucks the rest out later. Transfer stations tend to be smaller and often covered, which matters on a rainy Saturday. Fees at both types land in a similar range once you account for flat rates versus per-ton pricing. Pick on distance and hours, not on which kind of facility it is.

The real DIY math, one more time

We ran the full numbers for a half-truck garage cleanout against Miramar's fee schedule in our Miramar guide: a U-Haul pickup rental, mileage for two round trips, fuel, the dump fee twice, and a tarp lands at $210 to $245, plus four to five hours and a friend. Our half-truck rate is $269 flat, including loading from wherever it sits, the drive, the dump fee, sorting out what the landfill refuses, and a sweep of the space. The math moves a little at every facility, since fees differ, but the shape of it does not: DIY wins on a single item if you already own a truck, and a flat-rate haul wins once you are past a half-truck load.

Frequently asked questions

How many public dumps does San Diego County have?

Twelve, on the county's official landfill and transfer station map: four landfills (Miramar, Sycamore in Santee, Otay in Chula Vista, Borrego in Borrego Springs) and eight transfer stations (Palomar in Carlsbad, Escondido Resource Recovery, EDCO Station in La Mesa, WM Refuse & Recycling in El Cajon, SANCO in Lemon Grove, EDCO Recycling & Transfer on Dalbergia Street, Ramona Transfer Station, and Fallbrook Transfer Station).

What is the difference between a landfill and a transfer station?

A landfill buries your load on site, permanently. A transfer station weighs and sorts your load, then trucks it to a landfill somewhere else. Transfer stations are usually smaller, faster in and out, and often covered, so rain is not a factor.

Is there a free dump day in San Diego County?

No single county-wide free day. Individual facilities run their own free drop-offs for residents who show ID: green waste and clean wood at Miramar, free mulch and up to 10 free mattresses per visit for unincorporated county residents at Ramona, and similar programs elsewhere. Check the specific facility's guide before you drive out expecting it to be free.

Can I use any San Diego County dump, or only the one in my city?

These are public facilities open to anyone in the county, not just city residents. The catch is pricing: several, including Miramar, charge a lower flat rate for waste generated inside their own city and a higher non-city rate for everything else, so bring ID that matches your address.

Which San Diego County dump is cheapest?

We only quote a number once we have verified it against the operator's own fee schedule. As of this guide, that is Miramar, Palomar, Escondido Resource Recovery and Sycamore, each with its own fee table linked above. The other eight are still unverified for fees; do not assume a transfer station is cheaper than a landfill, it is not a reliable rule.

Do San Diego County dumps take mattresses for free?

Several do. Miramar's mattress drop-off at 5161 Convoy St is free with no limit, and Ramona takes up to 10 free per visit for unincorporated county residents. Palomar and Escondido have their own free mattress rules, covered in our mattress disposal guide.

Why doesn't this page cover fees and hours for all 12 facilities yet?

We publish one facility guide a week, and every fee and hour in a Haul Boys guide is checked against the operator's own page before it goes up, not copied from a directory. Four are live. The rest are coming; this page gets a link added the day each one ships.

Sources, fetched and read directly: our own Miramar guide (https://thehaulboys.com/blog/miramar-landfill-dump-guide/), Carlsbad / Palomar guide (https://thehaulboys.com/blog/carlsbad-dump-palomar-transfer-station/), Escondido guide (https://thehaulboys.com/blog/escondido-dump-guide/), and Santee / Sycamore guide (https://thehaulboys.com/blog/santee-dump-sycamore-landfill/), each already verified against its operator's own fee schedule. From search snippets only, not opened directly (WebFetch was blocked in this session; call ahead to confirm before a special trip): Otay Landfill address and Republic Services Chula Vista customer line (Republic Services Chula Vista location page, republicservices.com/locations/california/chula-vista; CalRecycle Otay SWIS facility site summary, sandiegocounty.gov PDF); WM Refuse & Recycling El Cajon (WM Solutions facility listing, wmsolutions.com/locations/details/id/679; San Diego County landfill and transfer station map, sandiegocounty.gov PDF); EDCO Station La Mesa (EDCO public facilities page, edcodisposal.com, mirrored at del-mar.edcodisposal.com/public-facilities/edco-station-la-mesa); SANCO Resource Recovery Lemon Grove (City of Lemon Grove C&D recycling list, lemongrove.ca.gov PDF; EDCO contact page, corporate.edcodisposal.com/contact-us); EDCO Recycling & Transfer, Dalbergia Street (EDCO public facilities page, edcodisposal.com/public-facilities/edco-recycling-transfer-dalbergia-street); Ramona Transfer Station (California DTSC treated wood waste transfer facility listing, dtsc.ca.gov/treated-wood-waste-transfer-facilities; EDCO public facilities page, campo.edcodisposal.com/public-facilities/ramona-transfer-station); Fallbrook Transfer Station (EDCO public disposal sites page, edcodisposal.com); Borrego Landfill (Republic Services San Diego County municipality page, republicservices.com/municipality/san-diego-county-ca; Wastebits facility locator, locator.wastebits.com/company/republic/p6). San Diego County Department of Public Works official landfill and transfer station map (sandiegocounty.gov/content/dam/sdc/dpw/SOLID_WASTE_PLANNING_and_RECYCLING/UpdatedCDResources/LandfillTransferMap-Eng-Span.pdf), referenced for facility names and jurisdiction, not re-fetched this session. Drive times are Google Maps off-peak estimates from Carlsbad, same method as our other dump guides. Haul Boys prices from our pricing page. Several sources for the eight unverified facilities disagreed on phone numbers (SANCO and EDCO Dalbergia each had a second number cited by a newer EDCO corporate listing); we used the number matching the San Diego County DPW map and our prior research file, and flag it here rather than guess.