Rochford rolls out fortnightly kerbside recycling service

The service has been funded from the 5 million grant allocated by the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs to the county of Essex. Rochford worked in partnership with Essex County Council and the other district councils to secure the funding.

It is planned that all residents will be able to access the new recycling service by the end of the year. The households of Rochford will each receive a 55-litre blue box for recycling glass, cans and tins. There will also be a reusable plastic sack for paper.

Residual waste will be collected weekly, and this will be extended to areas where it is only collected once every two weeks. Residents will also be able to purchase a fortnightly collection of green waste during the summer.

Rochford’s corporate director of financial and external services, Roger Crofts, said a final price had not been formally decided for buying into the green waste collection scheme, but it was likely to be around the 45 mark.

“Our recycling target for 2005-06 is 18% and we are already at 10%,” Mr Crofts added. “By going out to the whole district I think we will reach that target and it also allows us to meet the requirements of the [Household Waste Recycling] Act where we have to provide kerbside collection to all residents by 2010.”

Colchester
Elsewhere in Essex, Colchester district council has introduced multi-compartment vehicles that can collect recyclables as well as residual waste. The kerbside collection will alternate between glass, cans, foil, paper and textiles one week and garden waste and plastic the next.

Epping Forest’s fortnightly green waste collection service began again at the beginning of the month for the 45,000 households in its blue box collection area. The district council is considering rolling out the service across the year.

And Brentwood Borough Council is celebrating the success of its new yellow boxes and single recycling days. In the three weeks after the scheme had been established, recycling had more than doubled and some streets saw 100 per cent participation, the council said.