While your local Mo-and-Blo crew has been blowing sticky wet leaves down the road, past your window and under your front door at runway sound levels for the past decade or so it appears Walnut Creek is ready to look at alternatives – after we get through the current Winter Leaf Drop, at least.
Local council members Tuesday advanced a move to ban the use of gas-powered blowers in the city – with some exceptions – while providing a sufficient educational window to get the word out about the advantages of transitioning to quieter, battery-powered gear.
If approved as expected after some minor language tweaks at a later hearing, the city could require homeowners and landscapers to make the shift by April 1, 2026 or face potential “enforcement” actions – which may mean a ticket but which has remained rather loosely defined.
The city’s Public Works department reported it has already made much of the transition, representatives informing the council at Tuesday’s hearing their workers are already using battery-powered equipment on city properties about 95 percent of the time. Public works officials acknowledged that in some scenarios, such as when the ground is especially wet, only gas-powered gear packs the essential “oomph” to peel a leaf off the pavement and blow it where needed, and that they use gas-powered devices in extreme cases and emergencies.
Acknowledging that the issue has sparked intense criticism from residents complaining of noise and noxious fumes for “several years” and that approximately 90 percent of the public responding to civic outreach appears solidly in favor of the ban, council members expressed concern about what enforcement would look like, how small landscaping companies could be helped with the cost of new equipment, and if relaxed standards could apply to larger property owners like condo associations and HOAs.
Private citizens speaking before the council and in favor of the ban admitted they had been blissfully unaware of the prevalent use of gas-powered blowers because they had previously “been at work,” noting current dawn-to-dusk usage only after retiring and spending more time at home.
When approved, Walnut Creek’s ordinance would prohibit the use of gas-powered leaf blowers by anyone in the City of Walnut Creek, including City staff and contractors working on City-owned property. Exemptions apply to use during emergency cases as approved by the City or other first responders.
Staffers cited established findings that gasoline-powered leaf blowers create air pollution and pose health risks to operators and individuals nearby. They also cite AB 1346, which was approved in 2021 and began in 2024, which prohibits the sale of new small off-road engines, including lawn equipment.
More than 100 California towns and cities have imposed restrictions or bans on leaf blowers, including Lafayette, Pleasanton, Piedmont, Emeryville, Novato and Oakland.
An attempt to impose a similar ban on blowers in Orinda by a local group called “Quiet Orinda” garnered national press attention but was rejected by the Orinda city council in 2010 – the council voting unanimously that the city’s existing noise ordinance, which restricts the hours of leaf blower use, was sufficient.
California has banned the sale of all new small gasoline engines, not limited to leaf blowers. Statewide, not just in suburbia.
I love my 40 volt electric leaf blower, but this is overkill. Some jobs require a gasoline engine.
Currently, I have our landscaper blow only once a month rather than weekly and look forward to the new ordinance.
Every little bit helps! We also found that rakes and brooms work on those pesky hard to get leaves…
Rakes and Brooms? What is this, 1950? I need horsepower baby to blow those leaves back to where they came from!
Joke if you must but rakes and brooms separate Finland from the rest of the world in beautiful wildfire management. So, sayeth our leader. Praise be!
Rakes & brooms? Are you discriminating against the disabled? The elderly? It must be nice to be a strong healthy 18 yr old with no arthritis, no torn rotator cuffs, no back problems, no spine disease, no raynauld’s phenomena, no obesity, no knee problems, no long covid, no cancer, no tendinitis.
Fact is, battery powered anything is not what it was 5 yrs ago. It’s getting better by leaps and bounds, lighter, faster, longer lasting. Once the law passes, more firms will start producing E-blowers causing competition and driving the prices down. I just bought an electric chainsaw from costco for $69, unbelievable what it can do! Craftsman already have adopted battery powered hand tools.
The future is here, landscapers should have 1 E-blower and a bank of 6 batteries charging in the truck. Or they can have a 200 ft. power cord and use AC E-blowers. I imagine their batteries will be similar to an e-bike’s battery.
Soon we’ll have robots to do this work. In China, they already mow their lawn with a giant roomba type machine.
If passed, i doubt if it would be enforced, like the lack of enforcement for kids weaving in and out of traffic with an e-bike/e-scooters. Landscapers will be bold and defy the law knowing that police don’t come for misdemeanors. But the PD could invite the INS to come pay a visit to Walnut Creek. That will scare the landscapers to be on the up and up with their E-blowers.
So California banned the sale of new gasoline engines? But Newsom wouldn’t sign a bill that would ban the sale of new teflon/pfas cookware? And the left leaning mainstream media conveniently forgot to let the public know about this? His reasoning was that it wasn’t financially feasible. Read between the lines and you’ll know that the big corporations like dupont, monsanto, etc. donated to his campaign for president.