Kettering has just rolled out the second phase of its alternate weekly collection service to 12,000 residents. The first phase of the scheme – which sees a grey bin used for the collection of green waste and cardboard, alongside red and blue boxes for the collection of newspaper, glass, cans and plastic – was rolled out in October 2004.
Households on the first phase have been achieving a recycling rate of 50% and early indications suggest the second phase of the scheme will achieve a similar rate with an expected participation rate as high as 97%.
The council believes that part of the reason why it has achieved such a good collection rate on its scheme is because residents did not have to change the day they put their bins out for collection.
John Bugby, waste and amenities policy manager, explained: “When we brought the new scheme in we kept everything to the same day. Refuse is collected on one week, and the following week recyclables are collected on the same day.
“We also sent out information leaflets, reminding the residents of the new scheme implementation, on that day of the week and the bins and boxes were also delivered on that day,” he added.
Roll out
Mr Bugby also believes that residents need to receive the boxes and bins as near to the start of the new scheme as possible. Kettering supplies the bins to residents on the day of a household's collection, two weeks before the first collection of recyclables.
“This way residents don't have to worry about storing the boxes and bins for a month,” explained Mr Bugby.
The scheme has been rolled out with the aid of a 1.39 million grant from Defra, which was awarded in December 2003.
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The final phase of the scheme will be rolled out in April 2006 to around 15,000 households. Mr Bugby said that since the Defra grant was awarded a further 1,500 households had been built.
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