Fortnightly waste and weekly recycling collections

Every so often you see in the press people up in arms because they have been threatened with (or have got) fortnightly refuse collections and weekly recycling. I've always felt that they were making rather a fuss, as we would be able to cope with this and they should just get on with it.

Well, I've now got the opportunity to find out what it is really like as our local authority have recently introduced exactly this format. I thought I would give you a regular update as the new system comes in.

Let me set the scene.

We are a family of four adults and we are all careful about recycling. We're probably not as careful as we could be about what we consume as there is a reasonable amount of packaging goes in and out, but old clothes, books and odds and ends go to Oxfam, outgrown toys to the church bazaar and we are members of Freecycle.

Our local authority introduced wheelie bins about 8 years ago and we made them take away the enormous one they had provided and give us a small one. Most of the time we only half fill it.

I bought a 2nd dustbin just before LMC was born, more than 20 years ago to keep the recycling in as we had to take it to a Recycling Centre or local bottle and paper banks. I think doorstep recycling came in about 8 years ago with the wheelie bins. I'm trying to remember what we were given to put it in to start with. A few years ago we were given rectangular boxes. My sister lived in a road that piloted these and they had no lids which meant piles of soggy paper. When they rolled it out, we all got lids (but my sister didn't 'cos they'd already got boxes!) Later we were given small "lockable" boxes for food recycling, with a caddy for indoors and sturdy bags for garden waste.

Then a couple of weeks ago, everyone was given a green lidded wheelie bin for all recycling. Except us - for which we are very grateful as we really do not have room for another wheelie bin. we don't really have room for the one we've got. It stands bang inside the front gate, in a little extra square of paving attached to the path. The only reason it isn't a flower bed is we had to dig it up soon after we moved in to find the stop-cock and we paved it for access to the water! So we were provided with two rolls of bags and were told we would be given more when needed.

We've still got the rectangular boxes blocking up the porch, but my plan is to put them out the back and store the bags in them, then carry them through once a week. Likewise the food bin. It's easy having that by the kitchen in the summer as I tend to have the back door unlocked. I might even use the "recycling dustbin" a bit more. At present I store odds and ends that don't go to doorstep collection.

I'll tell you how the first couple of weeks have gone next time

Here in Bedfordshire, we went some time ago for alternate fortnightly collections of general waste, and recycling+green waste.

This did cause a lot of commotion over stinky bins. This would have been a much less of a problem if the weekly food waste collection we now have had been introduced at the same time. With food waste collection there is nothing much to make a smell; in fact our recycling now takes so much stuff it feels like you are hardly allowed to throw anything in the bin anymore ! I am agog that some people manage to fill their wheelie bins to overflowing. Having said that, there are only 3 of us, no pet related waste and no nappies ...

What I would really like to see is a change in thinking; so that instead of automatically throwing things away, you think first "what can I reuse this for ?".

Chilli-head wrote:
I am agog that some people manage to fill their wheelie bins to overflowing. Having said that, there are only 3 of us, no pet related waste and no nappies ...

What I would really like to see is a change in thinking; so that instead of automatically throwing things away, you think first "what can I reuse this for ?".

Well said. What does bother me somewhat is that we (just 2 adults) are producing more landfill waste now than I used to some 20-25 years ago, with 2 adults and 2 children. So much food is packaged unnecessarily. I have always recycled, long before it was fashionable to do so. My kids would squash any cans with grandad's 'floomper' and they would be stored in a box in the garage, along with paper, cardboard and glass jars/bottles. Then every few months we would take them to the recycling bays at the local tip.

I recycle more now, but then I would have half a normal sized dustbin full for the four of us each week of landfill waste. Now I have half/two thirds a large wheelie bin full each fortnight.

I do as much as I feel able, but find the amount of waste pretty depressing. A free pen with a charity begging letter. Plastic wrapped junk mail. Sigh.

Pen really annoys me too FB but apparently research has showed that it works and people use it to fill in form and give money Though I think I've not had one recently, perhaps they are not so cost effective any more.

And I think food packaging counts for too much of our waste.

We have just started on alternate weeks for recycle & landfill waste with the food bucket every week. I admit that it has improved my recycle a lot. Before it was so easy to just throw the rubbish in the bin, but now we have to think. Main problem is getting the OH to remember what goes where & when

It's simple here - landfill rubbish every week, in black plastic bags, and mixed recycling once a fortnight in clear sacks. The one thing we can't recycle in the bags is glass, so that gets collected in a box in the larder then goes to the bottle bank once in a while. Foil has to go to a collecting point at Sainsburys in Hereford and plastic bottle tops to Lush in Worcester. Simple(ish!!!)

I have 4 wheelie bins!!!

Grey - for general waste, collected fortnightly but sometimes I don't put it out as there's hardly anything in it.

Blue - which we've had for a while for glass, plastic bottles, and cans - collected monthly. This used to be a lidded box but people complained it was too heavy to move when full, which for some people it probably was. Also the lids never stayed on properly.

Brown - used to be just for garden waste and raw fruit/veg compostable wastes. Now it's for garden and all food waste (including meat/bones) and we have a caddy for indoors (biodegradable bags supplied) to empty into the bin. This is collected fortnightly but I hardly ever fill this, not much food waste here and what there is usually goes to the chickens. Anything not suitable for them to eat goes in the compost bins along with most garden waste (woody stuff goes in brown bin)and what I clean out from the chickens. Collected fortnightly so no real complaints about smelly bins

Green - this one is for all paper & cardboard and now tetra packs. We used to have a green bag but when it rained they got horrible and wet and when emptied they would just blow around the street. Collected monthly

so.... our collections are grey
brown/green
grey
brown/blue

Good grief AJB. Where do you keep them all?

Luckily I've enough room at the side of the house to keep them but I live at the end of a cul-de-sac and on the weeks everyone puts out 2 bins each it gets a bit awkward to find pavement space. And then when I get home it's a search up and down the street to find my bins!

I drove past a wheelie bin the other day (obviously keeping my eyes on the road...) and noticed that it had a Banksy style (slightly sinister) smily face sprayed onto it to identify it. If we were allowed wheelie bins I would definitely have something unusual on it to identify it!

Dandelion wrote:If we were allowed wheelie bins I would definitely have something unusual on it to identify it!

I've not got around to doing it yet, but intend cutting an illumination style, calligraphic stencil with my house number, and using spray paint to apply it to the bin. That should be sufficiently different!

I have also noticed that on bin days the streets are much cleaner than before.

What a successful day yesterday, when the people came around to do the assessment they considered that as we are in a terrace would give us recycling sacks, but we are end of terrace & have a side entrance so I phoned & appealed at the begining of Feb & yesterday we became the proud parents of our very own very large green beelie whin...

Then when we were coming home from shopping we spotted the new local rubbish officer snooping through a very large pile of rubbish bags that went out on the wrong week, so I went over and told him exactly where they came from (the flats belonging to the local druggie yobbery... Tee hee... Been waiting to get them for years... )

We have 3 wheelie bins

A large one with a bright green lid for Green Waste
A large one with a bright yellow lid for ALL recycling
A small one with a red lid for waste

The small one is emptied every week and the other two alternate so they are each fortnightly

We can choose which size of each our household has and the smaller Red one is the bigger discount you get for the fees on the rates

Kristy lee wrote:
We can choose which size of each our household has and the smaller Red one is the bigger discount you get for the fees on the rates

It's a great idea, shame this can't be made to work here. If we had a scheme like that, the lowlife would undoubtably take the smallest bin so as to save money, then either fly-tip their excess rubbish or shove it in someone else's bin !

if we have a party we "borrow" some of our neighbours bin. If they have a party they "borrow" some of ours. Our entire street is like that as we are the only young ones. I wish it were like that everywhere