Goodbye winter garden collections

img_3072It looks like the weekly year-round door-to-door garden waste collection will soon become a thing of the past.

The collection in the winter months was introduced just two years ago, but proposals to be discussed by Redbridge next week could revert to the previous situation where waste was collected in summer months only. If agreed, collections would stop in December and not begin again until March. In future years collections would run only between March and November.

Councillor John Howard, Cabinet member for Environment and Sustainability, said: “In 2013 the Council extended the Green Garden Waste collection so that it continued all year round.  This was possible thanks to £1.1m of funding from the Department of Communities and Local Government.

“This funding has now run out and we need to adapt to this and the other financial pressures we face.  We don’t want to scrap the service because we know residents really value it so we propose to make it available at the times of the year when there is the greatest need.”

At the time it was introduced, Wansteadium did wonder how much green garden waste was actually produced by gardeners in the depths of winter, though having the door-to-door collection of Christmas trees was undoubtedly welcome.

If the proposals are agreed though, a collection of Christmas trees will still take place in the first two weeks of January, on the same day as normal rubbish and recycling.

9 thoughts on “Goodbye winter garden collections”

  1. My garden incinerator could be working overtime in the future. How would that be a ‘green’ solution? Fed up with the entrance delays at Chigwell Recycling Centre. 15 minutes of my life wasted last week just queueing to get in and that’s not the first time either. Not prepared to tolerate that through the winter.

  2. I’ll be extremely disappointed if the winter garden waste collections are withdrawn. They are so useful. With our recent milder autumns and winters, the season has been extended and it is not realistic to assume that garden waste suddenly ceases during October! It will mean lots more people using their cars to go to the dump more often and this is not a green solution. Could the Council consider continuing the collections through the winter but perhaps a bit less frequently? Say every other week or at a push once every 3 weeks. But we would need to know which week they were coming. And/or could they reinstate additional Sunday collection sites for the winter months through the borough (eg in the Leisure Centre car park). I expect people will end up concealing their garden waste in their ordinary rubbish. Not what we need!

  3. Because of the prolonged warm weather many of us have delayed clearing back till now ,my neighbours and I have done some major works these last few weeks and the green waste collectors have been very busy in our street .Let’s hope we do keep it for the Spring to Autumn months or is this the beginning of the end ?

  4. I saw them collecting garden waste today and was just wondering how useful and worthwhile it actually is. To compensate people just need to start a garden compost. I have one and think it’s great. For the limited amount if Wenger garden waste it’s ideal. The council usually sell them for a few pounds on a regular basis.

  5. Why does the tax payer cover people to maintain their gardens; bit like high income pension contribution tax relief, surely?

    Nice to ; yes

    Necessary ; no

  6. Agree that we should all have our own compost bins and, yes, we bought ours at a very reasonable price from the council a couple of years ago – have just spread last years binful around the flower beds and it is good stuff! With all the loft conversions going on in Wanstead, you could pick up 3 pallets and make a compost bin from them for free! It is a bit of a luxury having garden waste collected (some boroughs only collect household waste once a fortnight) and I wonder if the council would still come out for a large collection if required just as they do for a sofa or a fridge? As for leaves – pile them in a corner or create a chicken wire basket to stuff them in where they will soon reduce in size and rot down into leafmould which is a great addition to our local clay soil adding bulk and helping to aerate it.

  7. The garden waste collection always used to stop in the winter but you could phone ask for a collection and when they had a reasonable amount in an area they would collect it usually in a fortnight. Surely that was a better way. Yes, agree with composting – I’ve got 3 large wooden bins and 2 plastic – but if you’ve a large garden you’d soon have more compost bins than beds!

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