Rubbish and Recycling
Posted: Wed 8 March, 2006 Filed under: Domestic, Green, Thoughts 3 Comments »Over the last year or two I’ve got more and more into being Green, recycling as much as possible, and all that eco-friendly gubbins.
A lot of our recycling is collected by the local council, who have a bizarre timescale involving collecting the recycling once a fortnight, garden waste once a fortnight, and domestic household rubbish once a week. In light of this, it’s sometimes interesting for me to look at what’s being collected from other houses, and how much recycling waste they accumulate as opposed to just chucking it all in the bin to be collected weekly.
And the simple result is that most people do just chuck it all in the standard bin, despite the provision of recycling collection bins/tubs etc. Since we started doing the recycling properly, we normally chuck away one bag of “normal” domestic rubbish a week. That’s it. All the rest is recyclable.
I think that probably the best basic way to get people recycling in our area is to swap things around again. Collect the recycling every week, and the household rubbish fortnightly. That way you’re making it harder for people to just chuck it away, and instead making it “easier” to recycle instead.
Now I “just” need to figure out a way to persuade the local council that this is a better way to do things. What’re the chances?
The chances are high Lyle, I am officially Dave Angel(‘s replacement) eco warrier. York City council have put domestic waste onto once a fortnight…………dunno if politics is owt to do with it but they are wooly liberals. It is in your best interests to argue and campaign basically because the landfill tax hits you directly in the pocket through your council tax rises (astronomic as per usual)although you will find most councils are relatively complacent about this position unsurprisingly. Financial penalties for targets not met also come out of your pocket too.
We have the same arrangements as you up here except for I have no plastic recycling closeby so that gets ‘stored’ and blitzed every once in a while. Bradford Council are amazingly lax, to the point where I would say they would unbung the most constipated person ever if taken orally in pill form.
Oh i forgot to say….lobby your local councillor, explain to him/her/it that if they do not value your vote and obey your demand (because that is what they are there for) you will
a) Set Greenpeace on them
b) set friends of the earth on them
c) pile your own domestic refuse in his/her/it’s front garden, a version of fly tipping but much more humourous
or finally
d) give the bin wagon drivers a large cash bribe to empty their wagon onto his/her/it’s lawn
Ah, were you actually here, I could refer you to my recent spate of posts about greenstuff. Obviously our council (possibly being the same one) collects on a similar basis to yours, although they don’t collect green waste. About six months ago we started composting kitchen waste, and this had a huge impact on the amount of household rubbish we put out. It’s almost a waste of a binbag to have it collected weekly, and our recycling bins are overflowing (have a look on your way past the house one day!). So I would agree with your suggestion entirely – switch the collections around!