One of the hidden costs of gas leaf blowers goes beyond the noise and pollution—they’re also a tool of excessive and expensive labor, sometimes used for tasks that could be done in far more efficient, quieter, and greener ways.
Unnecessary Labor & Overuse of Leaf Blowers
When you see landscapers using gas-powered leaf blowers to move just a few leaves off a driveway or the side of the road, it’s clear how inefficient this practice is. Sometimes it feels like they’re padding the bill with tasks that are a bit overkill. For example, instead of simply sweeping or raking a small area, landscapers will often resort to the loud and polluting blower, consuming fuel and time. It’s also a situation where you’re not just paying for the equipment, but for the hours spent running it, which adds unnecessary costs for homeowners.
One of the main complaints residents have is the frequency with which leaf blowers are deployed for tasks that could be easily accomplished by hand—like clearing small debris or dust. These leaf blowers are frequently used to clear just a few leaves or grass clippings, when traditional tools (rakes or brooms) would suffice. It’s a waste of time and resources when the work could be done in a fraction of the time with less noise and no environmental impact.
Alternatives to Gas Leaf Blowers
The most obvious alternative is the electric leaf blower. While they were initially not as powerful or efficient as their gas counterparts, modern electric blowers have caught up. They are quieter, cheaper to operate, and—perhaps most importantly—don’t contribute to air pollution. In fact, according to equipment manufacturers like Stihl, electric blowers save money in the long run due to their lower operating costs. The technology has come a long way, and while their initial price might be higher, the savings on fuel and maintenance costs quickly make up for it.
But there are even simpler alternatives: rakes, brooms, and sweepers. Especially when dealing with light debris, there’s little reason to reach for a gas-powered blower when a good old-fashioned rake could get the job done quietly and efficiently. For hard-to-reach corners or tight spaces, small electric blowers or even battery-operated handheld vacuums can work just fine. These methods may require a bit more elbow grease, but they are far more sustainable and won’t disrupt the peace of a neighborhood.
Leaf Blower Bans in Local Towns
Many towns across Connecticut are already ahead of the curve when it comes to limiting or outright banning gas-powered leaf blowers, recognizing both the health and environmental risks associated with their use. Some notable examples include:
- Greenwich: Greenwich has introduced regulations that limit the use of gas leaf blowers, primarily to reduce noise pollution. They’ve created designated hours when blowers can be used, particularly on residential properties, to keep disruptions to a minimum.
- Stamford: Stamford has been proactive in instituting a partial ban on gas blowers during certain months, and like Greenwich, they’ve focused on restricting their use during peak times to avoid noise-related complaints. While the restrictions aren’t as comprehensive as in some other towns, the city is moving in the right direction.
- Norwalk: Norwalk passed ordinances in recent years that also aim to mitigate the impact of leaf blowers. These ordinances limit their use in residential areas, again focusing on preserving peace and protecting public health. The fact that Norwalk is addressing the issue shows that even larger suburban communities are willing to put their foot down when it comes to creating more livable environments for residents.
- Scarsdale: Perhaps the most forward-thinking in our region, Scarsdale has gone as far as banning gas-powered leaf blowers entirely from Memorial Day to mid-September. This proactive step is a recognition that gas blowers aren’t just annoying—they’re actively harmful to the environment and human health, and their use is particularly unnecessary during the summer months when leaves aren’t falling.
Why New Canaan Needs to Catch Up
New Canaan is now one of the few towns in Fairfield County that hasn’t addressed the issue of gas leaf blowers head-on. While neighboring towns like Norwalk and Stamford have implemented restrictions, New Canaan’s inaction leaves residents and workers exposed to unnecessary noise, pollution, and health risks. As outlined earlier, gas blowers create substantial noise pollution, emit harmful exhaust gases, and are linked to a range of health issues, from hearing damage to respiratory problems. And as we’ve seen, many of the tasks for which gas blowers are used could be completed just as effectively with electric blowers or manual tools.
It’s time for New Canaan to step up and follow the lead of these neighboring communities. At a minimum, we should adopt restrictions that prohibit the use of gas blowers from Memorial Day to mid-September, the height of the season when the blowers are least necessary. This would allow residents to enjoy their summer without the constant buzz of leaf blowers in the background, while also encouraging landscapers to use more sustainable, quieter alternatives.
Conclusion
The excessive use of gas leaf blowers is an issue that affects both residents and workers in ways we may not always see. Not only do they contribute to noise pollution and health risks, but they also lead to inflated labor costs, especially when they’re used unnecessarily for minor tasks. By supporting bans or restrictions on gas-powered blowers—like those already enacted in Greenwich, Norwalk, Stamford, and Scarsdale—we can protect our environment, reduce health risks, and encourage more efficient practices in landscaping. It’s time for New Canaan to recognize the harm caused by these devices and take action.
Bravo Lars to step forward for this very significant issue. To the point..eloquently written.
Hear! Hear! Lars. Pun intended.
Thank-you for publishing this outstanding piece regarding the dangers of leaf blowers. Not only do leaf blowers create excessive noise and pollute the air we breathe but they are a bad practice that result in excess costs to the homeowner. We should all ask our landscapers to stop using gas leaf blowers on our properties this summer when there are so many good alternatives.
Bravo! This is well stated. Ask your landscaper to stop using gas-powered leaf blowers. Leaves are not evil — use a mulching mower to deposit the mulched leaves onto your lawn, for they are nature’s fertilizer. Reduce the size of your lawn and plant native flowers and shrubs to feed pollinators, bees and birds — they will come, and you’ll enjoy them and have less maintenance. Compost your coffee grounds, cut flowers, pumpkins and raked leaves — live WITH nature rather than trying to control it.
Admire your forthright explicit transparency
Well stated Lars. Hopefully this issue resonates with enough people to can to gain the attention of those with the power to implement sensible regulation, similar to our neighboring towns.
Finally someone gives some solutions and tells New Canaan to step up.
Well Done!! Thank you!
Thank you for this! I sure hope New Canaan bans the things – they are an assault on our town’s residents’ right to peace and quiet.
Well said. A ban is overdue.
While I somewhat agree with your editorial, it feels redundant and relies too much on anecdotal evidence. You could have simply said:
“Gas-powered leaf blowers significantly contribute to air and noise pollution, releasing harmful emissions and causing excessive noise. They pose health risks by dispersing fine particulates and toxic fumes. Banning them would encourage cleaner, quieter electric alternatives, benefiting both the environment and public health.”
Before implementing regulations on gas-powered leaf blowers, the town should ensure that the majority supports such measures. I would support a weekend ban but not during the week when most people are not home.
Thanks for replying but I disagree that most people are not at home during the week. Our town has a vibrant retired population and many stay at home professionals. Weekdays are when we’re impacted the most.
Thanks for following up, Lars, and for highlighting such an important issue. I was curious about the actual numbers, so I did some quick research. Based on 2024 metrics, around 16% of New Canaan’s population works from home, while 20% are retired senior citizens. That means roughly 36–40% of residents could potentially be affected—a larger group than I expected, though still not the majority.
How much longer are we going to put off taking ACTION? The landscapers hope NEVER!
This is something we can and should do. I hope our elected officials will take this up promptly – allowing for a notice period for landscaping companies to plan to replace their equipment with electric wherever possible. It’s also a great reminder that good old fashioned rakes and brooms have a place in our lives as well – electric is way better than gas but generating the electricity still has an environmental effect. The Wirecutter section of the NY Times has a great article about the best electric blowers for various uses if anyone is interested.
The more momentum around this whole idea, the better. What Greenwich has done is a good model for New Canaan – no gas blowers from Memorial Day through Labor Day. That way, we still allow them for the time of year when actual leaves are falling from trees, and we allow relative peace and serenity to return to New Canaan for the summer months. Some might say “well, landscapers will still use them!” or “how do you enforce it?” as if either argument is enough to dismiss the entire idea out-of-hand. Yes, certainly even with a ban there would still be some outlaws amongst us, just as there are folks who drive over 25 mph or park illegally now and then. But we most assuredly would see/hear a significant decrease in leaf blowers, and the occasional violations could generate some good fine $$.
Town leaders, let’s please give some serious thought to this matter and join our neighboring towns in doing the right thing. And keep the “next station to heaven” not smelling/sounding like the next station to Three Mile Island.
The Conservation Commission three years ago recommended restricting the use of gas-powered leaf blowers to the fall and early spring only. It went to the Town Council and died in committee. What happened was the Bylaws & Ordinances Committee spent some months taking testimony and discussing a possible amendment to New Canaan’s noise ordinance, and then sort of out of nowhere some Committee members started questioning whether the community would really favor such a restriction at all, and the whole thing went away. It would be interesting to see whether the Town Council as currently composed would take an actual position. I’m 99% sure that one of the advocates for a ban at the time was Kimberly Norton, who is a Town Council member that now sits on the Committee (not sure if she did back then).
I brought this up at our Town Council By-laws & Ordinances Committee on Wednesday night. I had the same recollection as you, Mike, and I know Jennifer Zonis is well versed in this topic, so I asked if Ms. Zonis and Ms. Norton would together lead the discussion at a near-future meeting and, potentially, draft a proposal. After the meeting, Ms. Norton declined that invitation so Ms. Zonis will take the lead.
We would love to hear directly from anyone and everyone who has an opinion on this-please feel free to email us at tcdistribution@newcanaanct.gov.
Thanks all!
Well said, Lars. As you point out, our town is clearly behind the curve when it comes to addressing the blight of gas-powered leaf blowers. The roar of these machines has become an almost daily assault—especially on weekends, when many of us seek a moment of peace. A summer afternoon in the hammock shouldn’t feel like you’re trying to nap beside a construction site.
To those new to town: it wasn’t always like this. Not long ago, landscapers managed to keep properties pristine without unleashing a barrage of industrial noise. The idea that this level of disruption is somehow necessary is simply false. It’s time we caught up with our neighbors and reclaimed some sanity. Enough is enough.
While switching to electric blowers is a great idea, they are not cheap. I’ve owned a Stihl BR600 gas blower for 16 years. It’s list price is $550. The equivalent electric blower is the Stihl BRA600 that lists at a whopping $1,450 with 2 batteries. That’s unaffordable for most DIYers.
While I’m a strong supporter of our environment, we need to be cognizant of the price tag.
P.S. I do practice low usage of my gas powered tools including No-Mow-May, mowing only once a month through fall, I also use the blower sparingly: only 3 times in fall, twice in spring.
The cost of switching to electric remains a major hurdle, both for infrastructure and EV adoption. At what point do we acknowledge that electrification is not the environmental panacea it’s often portrayed to be? Power generation is the second-largest contributor to greenhouse gas emissions after motor vehicles, and many power plants consume significant amounts of water for cooling—leading to thermal pollution when that water is discharged. Meanwhile, decisions driven by environmental concerns, coupled with the growing energy demands of AI initiatives, are straining power grids to the point of overwhelming them. As we push toward an electrified future, we must take a hard look at the full scope of its environmental and economic impact.
Thanks, Lars, for the well-written article. These issues keep coming up and are prominent on the “Next Door” forums as well. Who would not prefer to hear song birds and quiet instead of the incessant whine of the leaf blowers, as noisy as aircraft taking off.
The type of property maintenance practiced a generation ago, except for the greater chemical spraying prevalent then should be followed again. Mulching mowers, reasonable but not absurd levels of property care should be enough as the town practices at the parks and school fields. They don’t use broadleaf weed killers or chemical intensive fertilizers and the grounds generally look quite good even with some crabgrass or broadleaf “weeds”.
And let’s not kid ourselves about how profitable property maintenance work can be. The incentives are strong for landscapers to sell more and more treatments on the properties. Yesterday I was talking to an arborist bragging about the kind of money he makes spraying for gypsy moths and other pests on trees and ornamental shrubs using toxic sprays that kill many more insects than the ones he’s targeting. Hard-nosed sales people try to push anxiety about properties not being as perfect as those of their neighbors. Meanwhile the town parks and school properties that do not get the toxic sprays seem to have quite healthy trees.
Thank you for drawing attention to this important issue, Lars. As someone who works from a home office, the constant leaf blowing is a nuisance, not to mention the environmental and health impact. New Canaan would do well to follow its peers’ best practices.