Council issues advice and thanks for households with missed bins

Orkney Islands Council is thanking residents for the show of support and cooperation in last week’s wintry blast and issuing advice for those whose household waste and recycling collections were affected.

Householders whose refuse collections were missed or cancelled due to last week’s wintry weather are asked to store rubbish if possible until their next scheduled refuse collection, when they will be able to put surplus black bags out alongside their bins (or extra red bags if you use these).

For households whose ‘glass and plastics’ recycling collection was missed last week, the advice is to store any excess recycling until the next round of glass and plastics collections starting on 8 March, and to present the materials in separate bins as usual, putting out surplus recyclables over a couple of collections if needed. Remember to wash out bottles and squash plastic to reduce smells and make the most of your storage space.

In addition, people can:

• take excess rubbish to Hatston or Garson Household Waste Recycling Centres.
• take glass and plastic bottles to the Cursiter or St. Margaret’s Hope HWRCs.

Roads and Environmental Services Manager, John Wrigley, said: “The Orkney public did a great job of heeding advice issued last week to keep off the roads which helped us immensely in terms of getting roads cleared of drifts and over the worst in good time.

“Last week was very slow going for our collection teams and each day saw delays or properties that we just couldn’t get to. However the understanding and appreciation shown towards our crews has been exceptional and a real boost for staff.

“We took the decision on Tuesday (9 Feb), for the safety of our staff and others using the roads - and to allow us to put more staff out to support the winter weather response - to keep all our non-gritting heavy vehicles off the road and not attempt to carry out collections. Collection crews were reallocated to treating footpaths, topping up our 330 grit bins, and carrying out additional gritting on the roads.

“The fact one of our collection vehicles itself fell foul of icy conditions on Friday speaks volumes about the conditions were have been facing.

“We know it’s frustrating when collections are disrupted and we thank everyone for their patience and understanding of the limitations of our resources during challenging weather.

“We also appreciate it is a big ask for folk to store surplus refuse and recycling or cart it to recycling centres themselves. But our crews – who during those missed collection days continued to work hard in helping to keep our roads and footways clear – now have very limited capacity to ‘catch up’ on missed collections in what is already a very tight collection schedule.

“Unfortunately even in the best of weathers we rarely have spare staff or fleet to carry out missed collections.

“And while the majority of our Priority 1 and Priority 2 roads are now clear, we still have crews out trying to reopen the lesser routes from accumulated snow."