How big are your bins?

jackieb

We have a black box for plastics, glass and tins. And a white sack for paper and thin card. http://www.aberdeenshire.gov.uk/waste/kerbside/recycling.asp#recyclingbox We have a normal wheelie bin for all other rubbish (but we have 2, but we often don't have anything in the 2nd bin. Considering we were putting out 2 full bins each week before, and now we're usually down to one each fortnight, I think it's not bad going).

I have to go to the skip every week with a bag of plastics as the box just isn't big enough. There are no plastic recycling bins at any of the supermarkets (there are paper, glass and tins). I have twice got a nail in my tyre going down to the skip to recycle the plastic, as all sorts of rubbish gets dumped there.

It has made me for conscious of what i'm buying. I used to buy 2 litre bottles of cola all the time. When you see them in the box you can see where your money goes - about £1 for each bit of plastic!

The sack for paper is a stupid idea. The first time it's windy it'll be all over the place. My sister has a wheelie bin for her paper and that's only collected once a month - I think that's a better idea than the sack being collected once a fortnight.

Looking at that website, I didn't realise you could put aerosol cans in the box too!

SusanCarter

We have a standard size bin emptied weekly and a green box (paper, glass & tins/cans, not plastic or card/cardboard) emptied fortnightly. There's two of us and we usually put the bin out the opposite week to the green box. It's still never anywhere near full unless we've had a big clear out so we figured that it made sense not to be putting it out every week.

The family opposite us always have such a full bin that it doesn't shut but they always seem to have about twice as many people there as could possibly live there and they put their green box out too so I see no reason to judge the quantity they produce. Putting our bin out fortnightly does not encourage rats as the bin is closed and anything rats would like is probably in the compost heap anyway. I'm glad collections are weekly though as one time when the collection came four days late there was loads of rubbish blowing around the back street from bins which were overflowing. (It was summer holidays too so kids playing in the back street and probably more rubbish produced due to kids not being at school.) Also I imagine rats would be encouraged by the bins which are too full to be closed.

If they took card/cardboard and plastic in the recycling box then I imagine that most people would be able to manage fortnightly collections as those things form a large proportion of what goes into our wheelie bin.

EDIT: Perhaps you could solve the short term problem by asking a neighbour who has space if you can pop your extra bags in their bin as a one off?

donnalou

Fortnightly collection defiantly makes people think about how much rubbish they are throwing out. Having twin bins is a great idea as it forces people to recycle as I said in my first post if its not in the bin they wont take it, I just wish our bins were a bit bigger.
3 miles down the road from me is a different council both their bins are the same size. Its quite amazing how all the different councils have completly different rules on recycling.

I went to Asda this morning and bought some underwear, Why do think i need a hanger for a pair of knickers? I left the hangers at the till!

arkonite_babe

My local council has a fortnightly kerbside collection service and a blue bin for paper collected every month, we also have a weekly bin collection.

This is what my local council accepts in the red boxes:

Kerbside Boxes

I have 3 of these boxes and they are full each fortnight. I am carefull about what I buy packaged, b ut I still seem to fill the boxes each time

kittykat100

We have a black wheelie bin.. for normal rubbish..
a green wheelie bin... for recycables
a brown wheelie bin ... for compost
It is like wheelie bin wars round the back of our house!

Anyway... we recycle everything we can, and could really do with a bigger recycable bin.. we hardly use the brown one. Will try a bit more this year... we only really use it for garden waste.

jackieb

If all of your recycables are in one bin, how do the bin men separate them? As ours are in a box our bin men lift them up and sort the plastic, tins and glass into separate compartments at the side of the bin lorry. Are yours all tipped into the back of the bin together?

donnalou

Yeh they are all sorted after. We don't put glass or textiles in though

irnbru_2

jackieb wrote:

Are yours all tipped into the back of the bin together?

Yes, they are automatically separated at the recycling center. In Glasgow's case they cannot handle glass or cardboard in their automatic process.

This just highlights that recycling facilities should be the responsability of central govt. thus ensuring we all have the same facilities. Leave it to local govt. to do the collection.

RoCas

Lol ... I misread the title. I thought it said "How big are your buns?" :rotfl:

C_Ronaldo

We have a full size bin(not sure on its size), 1 green box for tins, jars, milk cartons, newspapers and any paper is collected too, we also have a compost bin for any veg peelings, shredded paper from shredder, at the nearby supermarkets they ahve them big recycling banks for newspapers, glass, tins, plastic pop bottles, detergent bottles/bubble bath bottles, cardboard, old shoes and clothes, carrier bags are recycled too at 2 of the supermarkets, sainsburys have started recyclng batteries(put them in a freepost envelope), theres other things that arent recycled like the container that them chilled ready meals come in, fruit juice cartons, detergent lids, jam jar lids, the plastic that the newspaper magazine supplements come in, lightbulbs is another which should be available(you can take the bulbs to the tip but its the other side of town and we dont go that direction much), the plastic that baked beans/tinned spaghetti come in, what about the bag the 24 walkers crisps come in surely that can be recycled

we were also given 2 green bags for garden waste and these are collected every other week