Slabs, patios, walks
Concrete removal: dumpster size by slab area
Concrete weighs 140–150 lb per cubic foot, so even a small patio passes the weight capacity of a 10-yard dumpster long before the box looks full. Pick the slab area to see its weight and the number of hauls.
- 1Slab areas 100–1000 sq ft
- 2Thickness 4 and 6 in
- 3Concrete 140–150 lb per cu ft
- 4Sizes for heavy debris 10 and 15 yd
| Slab | 4 in, weight | Hauls | 6 in, weight | Hauls |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 100 sq ft | 2.5 t | 2 × 10 yd | 3.8 t | 2 × 10 yd |
| 200 sq ft | 5 t | 3 × 10 yd | 7.5 t | 4 × 10 yd |
| 300 sq ft | 7.5 t | 4 × 10 yd | 11.3 t | 6 × 10 yd |
| 400 sq ft | 10 t | 5 × 10 yd | 15 t | 8 × 10 yd |
| 500 sq ft | 12.5 t | 7 × 10 yd | 18.8 t | 10 × 10 yd |
| 600 sq ft | 15 t | 8 × 10 yd | 22.5 t | 12 × 10 yd |
| 800 sq ft | 20 t | 10 × 10 yd | 30 t | 15 × 10 yd |
| 1000 sq ft | 25 t | 13 × 10 yd | 37.5 t | 19 × 10 yd |
Weight at 150 lb per cubic foot, the top of Iowa DOT's 140–150 range; hauls at the 2-ton low end of Republic Services' capacity for its heavy-debris sizes.
Rules of thumb that hold up
At 2 tons a haul, a 10-yard takes about 80 sq ft of 4-inch slab, close to Dumpsters.com's own line that a 10-yard holds "70-100 square feet of concrete or asphalt". At 6 inches the same weight is only about 53 sq ft. The box size does not change the answer: Republic offers concrete only in its smaller boxes, so bigger jobs mean more hauls, or a heavy-debris container with a higher limit where a hauler offers one.
How the slab weight is worked out
Volume is area × thickness: 100 sq ft at 4 inches is 33.3 cubic feet. Iowa DOT's materials manual puts normal-weight concrete at 140–150 lb per cubic foot, so that patio weighs 4,667–5,000 lb. Broken up, it takes more room: EPA's loose factor of 860 lb per cubic yard would put it at 5.8 cubic yards, an upper bound, since stacked slabs pack tighter. The box is never the limit; the weight is.
Small jobs at the town transfer station
Few town stations take concrete. Of the 36 on this site, Brookline, NH (free) New Boston, NH ($0.14 per pound ($5 minimum)) Stratham, NH ($175 per cubic yard) Kern County, CA ($16.85 per ton) Larimer County, CO ($20 per cubic yard) Henderson County, NC ($55 per ton (loads of 320 lb or less $10)) Bismarck, ND (free) Lexington County, SC ($28 per ton) Fairfax County, VA ($109 per ton ($49–$109 minimum)) name it on their schedules, and Danbury, NH and Marblehead, MA say they do not accept it. In Massachusetts, asphalt pavement, brick and concrete are on MassDEP's disposal ban list, so they go to recycling rather than the trash; see what you cannot put in a dumpster.
Related: concrete weight per yard, asphalt paving, rock and gravel, weight limits and overage.