Just read the Lewisham newsletter & saw changes to him collections coming in to most areas from October. Not sure if I’ve missed a post on this already, apologies if so.
Black bins to be collected fortnightly, plus food waste collections being introduced. Only for houses or houses converted into flats.
Think it’s good personally. If we’re on it with our recycling we barely have any landfill waste. We compost so may not use the food waste collection, although if they accept animal bones & cooked food, as some LA food collections do, that’d be brilliant.
There was an impassioned discussion on these plans a while ago but it’s probably good to have this new and separate topic now the plans have been confirmed.
I can see it explicitly in the Lewisham page but will all other bins, except the black bin, be collected weekly? It’s just the black bin that will be fortnightly?
I still feel it’s a yesterday’s solution to the problem, but it looks like this is all the council can do or afford. These days, machines at recycling plants are able to separate waste into its different components automatically, and usually much better than humans. And because many people don’t make the effort to always put their waste in the correct bin, this process has to place anyway before anything is being recycled.
Instead, we’re now going to have a fourth (fully staffed) diesel lorry running around the same streets doing different things. I can’t really see this being efficient or helping the environment. On top of that, we’re ending up with ever more bins lining up in front of our tiny houses.
Nice touch from the council though to provide inside bins and some biodigradable liners as well.
I hope there is an opt out for the food waste bins. I have virtually zero food waste as I compost everything that isn’t animal related (or, if fresh, it goes to the chickens). I guess I might have the odd bone but it would take me years to fill a food waste bin.
The plans seem badly communicated. We are a block of flats with communal bins so seems from the information on the website that we will to be exempt and will continue with the same regime as we have now, but when I checked on the new collection times our whole road was included in the new regime. There seems to be not useful way of contacting Lewisham Council to find out what will happen in October.
Hi all, just had a frustrating conversation with Lewisham council. We live in a converted block of flats in Honor Oak on a primarily single housing street - for 4 flats we have 3 black bins and 2 green, which are barely adequate for 4 3 bed flats. There’s no room for additional bins on the property without knocking down walls and paving front gardens, which we are unable to do directly (leaseholders - the rest of the flats are rented from a HA). Lewisham have offered three additional bins, which will have to be stored on the street. None of this seems suitable in light of the reduction in collections. Anyone else got this problem? Mods - if there is already a topic on this please merge - couldn’t see one on mobile.
I have noticed the new food and kitchen bins have been delivered great, except where there are multiple households the have delivered only one set of bins? Surely using council tax records the correct number could be delivered to the right number of (house) flats?
My understanding is that the food waste will be collected by the same lorry that does the garden waste. So, just the 3 we have currently doing more efficient work.
Have had the same thought. Don’t know honestly. One for sure is subsidising the other but as the food waste will contain any food scraps then that could get smellier so perhaps best not?
From Lewisham website:
All of the following items can be recycled in your food waste bin:
leftovers, uneaten food and plate scrapings
dairy products and eggs
bread, cakes and pastries
raw and cooked meat and fish, including bones
tea bags and coffee grounds
raw and cooked vegetables, mouldy fruit, peelings
grains and pulses including rice, pasta and beans
mouldy or out-of-date ready meals removed from all their packaging.
So this along with my compost bin, garden waste bin and recycling bin should mean the black bin will be fairly empty apart from those items that can’t be recycled.
I would like somewhere in SE23 that recycles textiles. All the textile bins seem to be miles away.
