Having just returned from Germany, the town I was staying in had waste collection points at the end of each street, with large separate bins for glass, plastic, metal and paper recycling. Collections were frequent I guess and this seemed to keep everything tidy, neat, efficient etc. Their plastic recycling rate is in the high 90’s percent I believe.

Yet here in the UK, each house/flat on our street has it’s own collection of 4-5 different colour plastic wheelie bins. In our street of approx 50 x houses that’s a total of around 250 individual plastic wheelie bins I guess, each getting collected at a confusing multiple of different weekly intervals.

So combined with increasing car ownership, the result is that our street/pavement is constantly littered with bins either waiting for collection, or waiting to be returned to the owners drive after collection, or sometimes just left in the street full stop. The result is not only that it looks untidy but that it’s also almost impossible to use the blocked pavement with a pushchair/wheelchair etc these days.

Surely adopting the German system above would be better – much more efficient to collect from 4-5 large bins at the end of the street than 250 or so individual bins scattered around the place surely?

To encorage more recycling and save money our council have just replaced our grey wheelie bins with new smaller ones at a cost of millions, yes millions! 😯 Why do our councils here in the UK continue to waste our money with short sighted schemes when clearly there are much better ways of doing things?

lolz @ getting Brits to walk to a bin at the end of the street! Never mind that the idea has come from Europe….

When we lived in Germany (early 2000’s) we had 5-6 bins just for our house, same as the UK – although I would imagine the flats/appartments were different.

Has it changed in Germany for houses too?

But, don’t disagree with your thoughts, although it’d mean someone in the street would have ALL the rubbish next to them, volunteering?

What I really like is buying your water, soft drinks, beer etc in glass bottles in the crates, return them and recycle to the same manufacturer for re-use. So much better than plastic everything.

Imagine the bin fires and people will dump sofas and dead inlaws in the paper bin.

Bin lorries can’t get down our lane so we have a central collection point that serves half a dozen houses. It’s a far better system.

I live in a large managed block of flats and they use the Euro system. Biffa turn up every few days to empty the bins so it’s never full, even if it is I just have to text FULL to a specific number of the management co. and they’re emptied within 24hrs. Briliant system 😀

Except for the fly-tipping we get from the gypsy camps nearby and the people from the houses on normal council collection. WE did have a lock installed on the bin stores but someone nicked it! I hate to say it but I think that if the communal bi system was rolled out nationwide it wold be abused by a large part of the British public sadly 😥

Portugal has the same system, large communal bins. Although they generally don’t empty them that often and there are normally piles of rubbish around them, so not very pleasant.

Lots of built up areas in the UK have communal street bins. The OP just needs to get our more 🙂

Portugal has the same system, large communal bins. Although they generally don’t empty them that often and there are normally piles of rubbish around them, so not very pleasant.

I was just thinking about portugal when reading the OP.

We couldnt work out what to do with our recycling when we rented an apartment in September. We had noticed the collections of big stainless bins dotted around but had never actually seen anyone taking waste to them until a few days in when putting ours in one of the local restaurant owners came over with a pile of bottles and cardboard, maybe everyone else did it in little bits every time they went out instead of a special trip. They were actually giant pits underground and I thought it was wuite a good idea. Was no rubbish in the streets and no piles of back bags outside of houses or restaurants etc.

Reidents in the uk are so posesive of their bins, even if theyre provided by the council. I live in a block of appartments split into 3 seperate blocks each with a bulk bins a recycling bin, a few of the neighbours tell other neighbours from a diferent block not to use their bins, even though its all the same building, and one bin may be full to overflowing.

Then when i work at customers homes, been told not to put shavings in the green garden waste bin, told to take my empty water bottles out of the recycling bin,etc.

and our local postal sorting office had a big sign on its bins prohibiting contractors on its site leaving waste in their bulk bins when they had a new heating system installed, mostly small boxes and some packaging.

I’ve noticed it’s like that in loads of places in the (French) Alps too. I much prefer it, it makes so much more sense. I wish the UK was more progressive.

USA here. Where I live, we have one large wheeled recycling can per house. All recycleables go in it; paper, plastic, metal, cardboard, glass. Once every two weeks, you roll it out to the curb and they’re picked up and emptied by a mechanical arm on the front of the truck. Its really only a PITA for cardboard; you have to flatten it and cut it up to fit without wedging it tight (so that it will stick and won’t empty). I’d have to say that participation is pretty good.

20 years ago, we had 4 little plastic stackable bins. Each one was for a different type of recycleable. There were a lot of problems with that system; participation wasn’t good. The bins weren’t labelled, so no one knew what went into each bin. And they were small, so filled up quite easily. Then people would put stuff into a different colored bin when they filled up the bin that it was supposed to go into. PITA!

The only thing that they could improve on is yard waste. They typically only collect that 2-3 times in the spring, and 2-3 times in the fall. I think that more people would participate if collection was year round (except for winter).

Germany has been streets ahead for years. They had better recycling in the early 90s than we have now.

This may be about to become an issue for me. Moving from a big block with communal bins to renting a house with bi weekly pickups on Tuesday. Only issue is gf works away Mon-Thur and I often have to travel for work. No idea how we’re going to manage to get the bins collected. Hopefully we have some friendly neighbors!

Copenhagen is pretty slick

http://www.copenhagenize.com/2015/08/my-city-sucks-and-its-great.html

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<p>Envac Group – Official company presentation from Envac Group on Vimeo.</p>

I’m lucky that if I miss the bi-weekly black bin it can easily roll over – pretty much one “carrier bag” a week waste unless the kids are here at the weekend then its two.
The system here is a joke though. Hants are awful – the amount of recyclable stuff that they won’t collect is unbelievable!
Seriously – stuff that has been specifically manufactured to be recyclable, stuff that has been recycled for years, etc – they won’t take it because they can’t sell it on.
Utter joke.
12yrs living in Spain – every street has a full set of huge bins, emptied every single night/morning. No dumping, everyone participates. even the landfill is virtually free unless you’re a commercial vehicle which is good.
House in Italy and France now and its the same. On the way out you stop, stand on the pedal, lid goes up, rubbish goes in and you carry on your way.
Simple – well you’d think so apart from this shitheap of a country not being able to get their head around something so simple.
Oh – the “basura” as its called in spain is pennies – literally each year. Italy we aren’t charged as it’s based on how much you produce/people in the house.
France – asked and told the same – no charge.
So what exactly is the £1000+ a year council tax going on then?

So what exactly is the £1000+ a year council tax going on then?

what kind of peasant only pays 1000 a year toward the council end of year disco?

Unsurprisingly, here in our part of Switzerland they kinda take things to the next level. Much of it is like germany as described (without the crates of glass bottles – agree that’s an awesome system), but with normal waste, we pay for each 35L bin bag we dispose of (about £3 per bin bag, each bag has to have this bin-sticker on it).

So far so good, forces you to keep pure waste to a minimum, and as recycling is free at various collection points it does encourage you. (Though on’t even think about doing it on a Sunday)

However, to take things to the next level, the swiss will investigate any bin bags dumped that are not within criteria, searching for clues as the identity of the owner who will then be dragged by the police to the bin-office for a fine or worse. Its mental, but as with most swiss things, if you can put up with the semi police state feel, it works a charm.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2014-06-04/swiss-garbage-police-irk-foreigners-reeling-after-vote

France – asked and told the same – no charge.

It’s included in the taxe d’habitation, in my case it’s part of the amount in the column marked ‘intercommunalité’. My not so accurate fag packet maths estimate is that it’s 600€ +- 50€.
1 collection a week for domestic waste, 1 for biodegradables (which gets composted) and everything else gets taken around the corner to the recycle bins.

Well I pay €360 a year so guess it’s in there somewhere then! But again – I did ask and was told “No” as it’s not a full time house I don’t pay anything yet. But I will if/when I quit england for it.

Hammy, is that an exoneration because it’s a renovation or something else?
Anyway, I’m getting my French taxes mixed up, it’s in the taxe foncière and is 470€ in the aptly named column ‘taxe ordures ménagères’

Nope – what the nice lady at the Mairee told me.
€360 tax fonciere a year.
One of the reasons I chose this one over some of the others was the ongoing costs whether I was there or not.

The single collection point might be ok when streets are relatively short, but the road I live on is approximately a quarter of a mile long, the house numbers go up over 130, so I can see a few issues arising…

Three bins here, one for garden and food waste, one for recyclables (everything except polystyrene) and one for everything else. Still end up doing tip runs for oversized or obscure stuff but most of it gets recycled, our waste bin can go 6 months between empties.