Forum Topic

Recycling of waste

Every week I and my neighbours in Castlebar road are forced to email or phone when a recycling bin has not been collected on the designated day.Email is easier than spending many minutes on the phone only to speak to an harassed councilofficer who takes a message and supposedly hands it to the recycling company.Often we have to email twice...recently, as I have for food box or garden waste[for whichI am paying £40 paWhen will the council get an efficient recycling collection.Oh,and I had a black and blue bin of smaller size delivered,not ordered,now sitting on the verge in Castlebar Rd ...how long before they are taken back???

Anthony Roden ● 3372d6 Comments

Unfortunately I think that they are unlikely to "look for" your garden waste - especially at the moment when there appears to be little continuity of crews.You mention that you have a massive wheelie bin.  Can you downsize? If you feel that you can then ask for a smaller one as you don't want to have to be worrying about it every time you put garden waste out.You can put extra recycling waste out bagged (don't use black sacks) with your recycling bin and flatten what you can to reduce the volume.An Italian friend showed me how to flatten those ribbed plastic water bottles.  Instead of flattening them by lying them down and standing on them (my standard method) remove the top and squeeze from the top down like a concertina then replace the top. Juice cartons can be flattened by using a teaspoon handle to lift the "ears" before flattening.  You may even win another mouthful of juice or enough milk from a milk carton for another cup of tea!(I don't know why people bother with bottled water in this country.  It is a habit that seems to have been imported.  We always ask for tap water.)BTW I've always seen the garden waste team first thing in the morning and the residual waste team much much later.

Philippa Bond ● 3364d

http://www.streetbank.com/?locale=en-GBStreetBank (the website) would probably be a good tool to use to offer/request small/large wheelie bins.And here's a new twist that happened to me this week: Our massive wheelie bin was out at the entry to my garden. The garden waste sacks were just behind it. (We pay extra for the garden waste as someone mentioned earlier in this thread.) Wheelie bin contents were emptied. Garden waste was ignored. I'm guessing the garden waste team can't be bothered to look behind (and then move) a giant wheelie bin to get to the garden waste sacks? Or perhaps the garden waste team simply did not turn up. I was too late reporting the missed pickup (which I did via the Ealing Council website), so we are stuck with full sacks of garden waste for another two weeks.

Thomas Bonasera ● 3371d

Thanks Philippa, I do have a long list of families waiting for bins, some also who need different sizes so if anyone does want to swap please let me know and I will help if I can.

Vanessa Costello ● 3371d

I wish it was easy to organise a swap shop.  A neighbour I was talking to would probably be happy to swap both her larger wheelies for the smaller ones.  Vanessa your family might well prefer the middle sized ones which she has. I don't of course know the neighbour well enough to know her email address or if she even has one.

Philippa Bond ● 3372d

I believe that there are quite a few people who are not online and who could do with smaller wheelie bins. They will have difficulty trying to manoevre even those.  There are some who are also afraid that the collection might change yet to three weekly - which if the collection is as erratic as it seems to be in some places at present - and requesting and getting a missed collection collected is difficult means a very very long wait.  There has to be and is supposed to be provision for larger bins should people's personal situation change. 

Philippa Bond ● 3372d

Anthony, I would be more than happy to move them for you and give them to one of many families who have not yet received their wheelie bins. We have been redistributing  abandoned bins to people who need them. You will find a story on our website about it if you google southfield conservatives. Please let me know if this is ok with you vanessa.costello@btinternet.com

Vanessa Costello ● 3372d