‘Spread the load’ festive waste advice

‘Spread the load’ is the advice to avoid waste problems during a bumper festive season with plenty of Christmas changes to kerbside collections.

To avoid uncollected materials, residents are urged to:

· Check the changed Christmas collection dates and plan how to deal with delayed pick-ups

· Shift pre-Christmas rubbish or recycling well before the holidays or go to a recycling site

· Sort and squash dry recycling (except aerosols and glass) to get more on each truck

· Store extra rubbish or recycling for later collections, or take it all to a recycling centre

A Somerset Waste Partnership spokesperson said, “Don’t let rubbish and recycling build up; shift it fast before Christmas – especially all that cardboard and other packaging – so you have space for festivities and fewer waste worries, especially if weather looks set to hamper collections.

“After Christmas and New Year, use the space in your boxes and bins, but either store the rest to put out over several collections or take it all to a recycling site.”

Recycling sites will be open on their usual schedules – including five sites open 8.00am-4.00pm seven days a week – except for the usual closures on Christmas Day, Boxing Day and New Year’s Day.

Nothing alters for waste collections until Christmas Day, so kerbside collections are unchanged on Monday 21st, Tuesday 22nd, Wednesday 23rd and Thursday 24rd December (Christmas Eve).

But collections of rubbish and recycling will not take place on Friday 25th December, Monday 28th December, Thursday 31st December, or Friday 1st January. Instead, the schedule will be:

· Collections due on Friday 25th December will be on Sunday 27th December · Monday 28th collections will be on Tuesday 29th · Tuesday 29th on Wednesday 30th December ·        Thursday 31st on Saturday 2nd January · Friday 1st January collections will be made on Monday 4th January

Then collections in week starting Monday 4th January will be one day later, including those due on Friday 8th January being made on Saturday 9th January.

Clinical and assisted waste collections follow the same pattern, while garden waste pick-ups are suspended from Monday 28th December and resume from Monday 11th January on usual days.

All recycling and rubbish collections resume from Monday 11th January on their usual days.

All information about festive waste services – and the easy way to recycle the Christmas tree – can be found on Somerset Waste Partnership’s website: www.somersetwaste.gov.uk