Fantastic! Haringey council to collect plastic from your recycling bin

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Permalink Reply by Maddy on October 12, 2009 at 18:57

I wonder if they are planning to give us smaller wheelie bins, now that so much is recycled. I hate the look of my great big one sitting out front hiding my windowboxes, and only put one bag of rubbish out every week. The neighbours have one wheelie bwetween three flats.
Also the newer green boxes have lids, which is a really good idea because stuff can go straight in them instead of storing it somewhere in the kitchen.

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Permalink Reply by Liz on October 12, 2009 at 19:45

Maddy, you can swap your big bin for a smaller one if you put in a request to Enterprise.

We had a discussion about it here and I successfully swapped mine a couple of months ago.

Your neighbours can request an extra bin or the larger size one if they have a lot of rubbish.

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Permalink Reply by Maddy on October 12, 2009 at 20:58

Thanks Liz I have e-mailed Enterprise asking them to beam me down a smaller bin and also requested a new recycling bin with lid, which a friend got when her old one broke.
Another good thing is that it won't get mixed up with my neighbours' bin, which they put rubbish in without using bags so it gets really disgusting - it keeps ending up back in my garden full of watermelon pips, food bones and once a broken set of false teeth! This despite having my house number painted in giant-sized letters on "mine".
Will let you know how I get on.

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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on October 13, 2009 at 12:32

I've heard of couple of instances where people had serious delays getting their wheelie bin swapped for a smaller one. (One resident was referred to Islington - though their address was clearly in Haringey.)

The swap process should be simple, fast and efficient. If residents have to keep chasing either Haringey or Enterprise, this wastes everyone's time and effort. It also wastes money; staff are spending time dealing with failure demand.

I'm asking Haringey Waste Management to keep an eye on this. They need to know how often the swap goes wrong, and why.

There's also a consequence that containers for recycled waste will need to be larger. I've heard nothing yet about plans to deal with this.

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Permalink Reply by Maddy on October 13, 2009 at 14:01

Got an answer right back from Haringey saying the recycling bin will come in ten days and the wheelie in2-3 weeks, so will keep you posted.

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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on October 28, 2009 at 22:14

Following-this up, I wrote to Haringey Urban Environment about swapping to smaller size wheelie bins; and storage for the increased amounts of recycled waste. I got this reply on 27 October.

Dear Cllr Stanton,

Swapping wheelie bins
I can confirm we are currently working with the refuse collection contractor in order for a reporting procedure to be put in place so that we are made aware when a problem occurs which may result in delays with processing a swap requests within target timescale. We will then be in better position to identify the reason in order to seek suitable solutions to stop this reoccurring in future.

In regards to increasing the size of recycling containers I would inform you that we are aware that the increase in the range of items that can be recycled over the last few years has led to storage problems for some residents, and are receiving an increasing number of requests for bigger boxes or wheelie bins. While this is obviously encouraging for us as we seek to get more people recycling, unfortunately we are not in a position to be able to change our container type at present.

The green boxes we currently use have a 55 litre capacity, which is the largest that national health and safety guidelines permit for recycling collections. As you can probably appreciate, our collection operatives each have to lift and carry several hundred boxes a day, and when fully loaded these containers can be quite heavy. If the boxes were any larger then we would be putting the staff at an unacceptable risk of straining injuries from the increased weight and bulk of the containers.

The only option is therefore to move to wheelie bins for recycling, and this is something that we are looking into. However, the costs of making this change are currently prohibitive (approximately £2M), and we are unlikely to be able to bring in wheelie bins for recycling until the new integrated Waste Management contract comes into effect in 2011.

In the meantime we can offer residents as many recycling boxes as they need to be able to recycle everything they can. The boxes stack inside one another when empty, and by using the lid they can be stacked on top of one another when filled with recycling.

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Permalink Reply by Liz on October 9, 2009 at 17:46

A little nerdy background from Mrs E on this:
"For the first time mixed plastics including yoghurt pots and margarine tubs, plastic bags, shredded paper and waxed cartons used for milk and fruit juice will be collected. This is as a result of two brand new contracts awarded to Bywaters and Greenstar Environmental Ltd by the North London Waste Authority (NLWA) in June which could save taxpayers up to £760,000 per year. The contracts will run until 2014 to ensure a smooth transition of service for when new waste and recycling facilities are in place as part of the long-term waste services contract currently being procured."

Source: North London Waste Authority

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Permalink Reply by Carol Tennant on October 10, 2009 at 12:33

Can someone clarify this for me please? Haringey's website says collections will also include "waxed cartons used for milk and fruit juice". Are these the same as tetra packs, like Tropicana juice (or similar)? Anyone know?

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Permalink Reply by Liz on October 12, 2009 at 17:02

Yes CM, they are the same.

Before you consign your Haringey People to the recycling bin, (plastic wrapper as well) have a look at the middle pages where there is a comprehensive explanation of what can and can't be recycled.

If your Haringey People has already gone, the October copy should be up here shortly; better still the Green Box recycling page is here

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Permalink Reply by Carol Tennant on October 13, 2009 at 12:10

Thanks so much for replying, Liz. I'll go and have a look at People and see what else I can cram into my two tiny bins.

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Permalink Reply by Stuart on October 13, 2009 at 15:34

We just went up to the Hornsey depot where they've got loads of all different kinds of recycling bins stored and asked them for a couple of extra ones. They were quite happy to hand them out. We use a couple of the tall food ones as well as the lighter green flatter newspaper one. May need another couple now!

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Permalink Reply by TTTH on October 13, 2009 at 15:59

I received an email from Jill warren this morning about a North London Waste Plan Consultation. Anyone else? There will be a draft plan online tomorrow and there is a survey which has questions about the plan.
I can post on here if you like?

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