Region’s wheelie bin service could be in for an overhaul

The region’s environment would be given a boost under a proposed plan to overhaul part of the kerbside collection service for wheelie bins.

Kerbside collection of green waste is being explored as an option for Gympie residents.

Green and organic waste could soon have its own kerbside collection with Gympie Regional Council exploring the possibility of introducing a third wheelie bin for households.

Residents could soon have the option of taking on the bin in a move to improve the region’s environment and curb costs to the council.

At least 2500 households would have to opt in to the scheme for it to work, councillors heard.

The cost would scale with the number of households taking up the option; at 2500 it would be almost $100 per home, compared to about $60 with 9000 or more users.

This could allow residents to reduce the size of their wheelie bins to 120L, or change kerbside collection from weekly to fortnightly.

Having a dedicated green waste bin would not be mandatory under the proposal.

The bins would not be mandatory.

Sustainability director Adrian Burns said other councils had found that if the scheme was mandatory people were more likely to use the designated green waste bin for household rubbish.

“You get a lot of contamination,” Mr Burns said.

“People are paying for a bin, they believe they’ve got a bin if their rubbish bin is full, they’ll just dump it in the green waste bin.

“They won’t differentiate.

“They’ll also bag rubbish and put that in.”

People taking up the offer at their own choice were less likely to do this, he said – but if they did they would ultimately find their bins being left untouched by the dump trucks on collection day.

“There’s cameras on the trucks,” Mr Burns said.

“If they open up your recycle bin (now) as it’s going into the truck and it’s full of green waste they’ll just put the bin back down.”

Throwing less green waste into Bonnick Road would also stretch the lifespan of the landfill, Mr Burns said.

Almost half of the average household wheelie bin was filled with green and organic waste, councillors were told at Wednesday’s workshop.

The proposal would still need to be presented to the council at an ordinary meeting to be approved.

Originally published as Region’s wheelie bin service could be in for an overhaul