A COUNCIL questionnaire appears to be gauging residents' views on potentially controversial changes to Solihull's waste and recycling service.
The online survey, which runs until the beginning of August, asks for householders' opinions on possible charges for garden waste and how often residents would want to have their rubbish collected.
Last year, Other Side of Solihull, revealed that Solihull Council was considering the introduction of fortnightly collections for household rubbish as a way of increasing recycling rates in the borough.
Following the launch of the survey, some residents have voiced concern on social media about the possible changes, warning that some of the options thought to be on the table could lead to more cases of fly-tipping or people burning rubbish in their back gardens.
Frankly I cannot see any advantage to be gained by halving the collection frequency; the overall weekly tonnage will remain the same, but halving the frequency will double the number of unloading journeys on collection days, thus losing a significant part of the working day.
ReplyDeleteAnother issue with fortnightly collections is the sheer volume of refuse generated by large families; if everyone had the time or the will to minimise their waste properly, then there *shouldn't* be a problem - but I frequently see black bins crammed to overflowing after just one week, so collecting every two weeks would be untenable.
A word on recycling; while SMBC has a (fairly) comprehensive list of recyclables, it's fair to say that there's an equally long list of things that won't be accepted - and in particular, plastics.
All plastics have the same basic makeup, and only minute changes in added trace materials give them the change in their properties; it therefore seems somewhat bizarre that *certain types* of plastic are regarded as taboo for recycling - much more thought should be given to expanding the range of recyclables, by which mechanism the waste tonnage going to landfill could be significantly reduced.