Going to the tip

[wheypat]

Tried yesterday : Shut all day

Tried at lunch time : Shut for lunch

Went this afternoon : Open (hurrah). Then I noticed 4 hard working council employees are at the tip. I say hard working, what I should say is 4 employees sat round a table with a parasol having a cup of tea. Any reason why this place needs 4 members of staff? Could you keep it open over lunch say if 2 went for lunch at 12 and 2 went at 1.

Come to think of it, have I ever seen it with less than 4 members of staff? An have I ever seen any of these people actually doing anything? When the skips get emptied/changed more 'workers' turn up to do that aspect of the job.

[tjh290633]

I have just got back from our dump, which is open 7 days a week, 9 to 6 in summer time. 10 till 4 in winter.

Some of the others are only open 6 days or fewer. Naturally most of the staff are immigrants, but very helpful. The queue of cars can be lengthy at times, weekends and holidays in particular.

No doubt the EU Working Time Directive can take some of the blame, and local council impecunity the rest, for limited opening hours.

TJH

[Itsallaguess]

Any reason why this place needs 4 members of staff?

I think this is one of those things that differs from town to town.

Our local tip is open 7 days a week, 8am until 6pm, and it's staffed by helpful lads who will go out of their way to give someone a hand.

They have their moments as 'tip-police' if people try to dump stuff they shouldn't, or people decide to put stuff in the wrong container, but I think this is fair when we consider that some of the containers can be declared as 'contaminated' if they contain the wrong stuff, so a level of care and attention is needed, which some of the public struggle to understand sometimes.

Often this is through no fault of their own, and can be blames on a lack of clear markings on the various containers, but generally our container layout has been the same for over 20 years now, since they enlarged the site, so any locals soon get used to the routine.

It's likely to be a cultural issue as to whether the guys are helpful or lazy, I should think, and it's probably difficult to turn around once a level of idleness settles in across the teams, but we're lucky that there seems to be a general desire to be helpful, so I can't have any complaints. It must be an awfully long day for any of the workers who don't muck in though - I think I'd much rather help out just to get the day in!

One thing I have done over the years is to now pick my times when I go to the local tip. I'll either get things packed the night before and head off for when it first opens, or leave it until 30 minutes before they close, as these are by far the quietest times, which means no queueing.

I've made the mistake of trying to get rid of stuff at 2pm on a Saturday afternoon, and I quickly learnt my lesson!

Cheers,

Itsallaguess

[bungeejumper]

It varies very much from town to town. But I think you may find that they're not council workers at all - instead, a lot of local authorities contract out the whole waste operation to private suppliers such as Biffa or Hills. And it's the contractors who employ the tea-drinkers, some of whom are there in such profusion for health and safety reasons. (Others actually engage volunteers to run the recycling bins - one of our fellow Fools is one, I think?)

One of our local towns has subcontracted the recycling site to a bunch of what certainly look like travellers. And they do a superb friendly job, sort the stuff with unusual vigour ( ) and never turn anything away like our nearest one does. What's more, they're open dawn to dusk, seven days a week. Can't think why.....

Whereas the corporation tip (managed until recently by Hills) was open only three days a week; regularly shut for 45 minutes without warning (whenever a full bin needed to be moved); and had a nasty habit of walking up and threatening you with prosecution if they thought you were getting the balance between electrical items and metal items wrong. ("That's two separate skips, innit? And don't let me catch you tipping brass plumbing bits into the copper bin. Oi, and where d'you think you're going with that plastic food packaging? We don't recycle anyfink except bottles in this depot, guv, so you can just stick your bleedin' Attenborough rubbish into the landfill bin if you know what's good for you.")

Grrr and double grrrr. As it happens, Hills have now lost the contract, and we have a new waste operator who says it'll be taking the Attenborough plastic waste one day. Should have been this month, actually, but it got delayed, didn't it? Patience, patience. That tea won't drink itself, you know.

BJ

[sg31]

When I lived in Brighton the local tip was badly run and the staff were rude and unhelpful. If a container needed replacing the tip was closed to traffic to allow the lorry to maneuver safely. this meant they would stop cars entering, wait until the last car already in the tip had left then drop off a container, pick up the full one, exit the site before cars could re-enter. On a good day 30 minutes, on a bad one over an hour. All attempts to tell them there was a better way were ignored. There were at least 20 containers on site so it was a regular occurrence.

Where I am now the tip runs efficiently, staff are pleasant and friendly, containers can be changed without disruption and the opening hours are more than adequate. It is a pleasurable experience and as a result recycling rates are good.

Generally I wouldn't expect anything council controlled to be much use, the local council prove that it is possible for them to be good.

[didds]

Generally I wouldn't expect anything council controlled to be much use, the local council prove that it is possible for them to be good.

Is it a council run tip, or an out-sourced private company run tip?

didds

[Lootman]

Generally I wouldn't expect anything council controlled to be much use, the local council prove that it is possible for them to be good.

Is it a council run tip, or an out-sourced private company run tip?

I'm not sure it matters. Either the council are at fault for running it badly or the council are at fault for choosing a bad private company and/or not monitoring and managing the situation.

My local tip has the exact same problems as sg31 describes.

[didds]

Generally I wouldn't expect anything council controlled to be much use, the local council prove that it is possible for them to be good.

Is it a council run tip, or an out-sourced private company run tip?

I'm not sure it matters. Either the council are at fault for running it badly or the council are at fault for choosing a bad private company and/or not monitoring and managing the situation.

My local tip has the exact same problems as sg31 describes.

Ah _ I meant the tip that was well run... is it actually a council owned tip, or an outsourced one? Though your point works both ways of course

didds

[sg31]

The Brighton tip was definitely not council run.

The local one I'm not sure about, I think it is privately run for the council but I'm not 100% sure. It just works, it really is a smooth operation.

In Brighton the skips/containers are on one level, laid out round the periphery of the site compound, there's a long driveway down to the compound, anyone using a van has to stop in a parking area outside and carry their waste into the compound or use trolleys provided. That is an instant problem because it creates a lot of foot traffic where cars are reversing.

In a car you wait the driveway until you reach the head of the queue, wait for a space at the appropriate bin and move to park in front of it. Anyone behind you who wants a different container which might already be vacant has to wait until you move. When you park in front of the container you have to carry your waste up some metal stairs to a metal walkway alongside the container then throw it over the side into the container, return to the car dodging anyone coming up the stairs carrying waste. Continue until finished. Reverse out avoiding pedestrians/ moving trolleys and exit. As mentioned previously it a container is full everything stops for up to an hour, there are a lot of containers and they fill quickly.

My local tip now has the containers in the centre in a long line at ground level. cars enter the site and drive round the perimeter road and up a ramp to a raised area to access the containers, reverse your car to within a few feet of the one you want, unload and drop the waste into the container then drive out. If it's busy you park as near to the container you want as possible and unload, if it's several types of waste it's easy to carry the items to where they need to go.

Any container movements are away from the public and don't interfere with access. Some types of waste go into hoppers and are hydraulically compacted before going into containers.

Sorry for the long post but I thought it might be worthwhile. Anyone with any experience can see the choke points and hazards in the first operation. The second probably was more expensive to set up but will save money long term from efficiency gains.

[XFool]

...then again!

Never mind the workers, WHAT ABOUT THE DRIVERS?

Try my local council tip. Final approach is down a straight road, then a further run up by an exactly parallel road running in the opposite direction - imagine a sort of single lane dual carriageway arrangement. So, you need to get from the 'down' (entering) lane to the 'up' (leaving) lane, obviously. How? By a genuine hairpin bend at the end.

So how do you negotiate the harpin bend? By going AROUND it!!! It's as simple and easy as that. Well...
Just to make it clear, very, VERY clear, this is marked on the roadway itself. The roadway to drive on (DRIVE HERE!) is roadway coloured, the roadway NOT to drive on (DON'T DRIVE HERE!) is entirely covered by a continuous area of white road marking paint, several square yards. Missable it ain't.

I have seen it happen time and time again: Bloke in car in front gets to start of hairpin, executes a hard right ("Bloke in front! It ain't a right turn."), I do not follow him but carry straight on (on the roadway) into the hairpin and GO AROUND the hairpin. Of course, on the exit to the hairpin I have to stomp on my brake to stop my car going into the side door of the 'bloke in front' who is now stuck straddling the hairpin, and we all wait while he extricates himself.

[robbelg]

...then again!

Never mind the workers, WHAT ABOUT THE DRIVERS?

Try my local council tip. Final approach is down a straight road, then a further run up by an exactly parallel road running in the opposite direction - imagine a sort of single lane dual carriageway arrangement. So, you need to get from the 'down' (entering) lane to the 'up' (leaving) lane, obviously. How? By a genuine hairpin bend at the end.

So how do you negotiate the harpin bend? By going AROUND it!!! It's as simple and easy as that. Well...
Just to make it clear, very, VERY clear, this is marked on the roadway itself. The roadway to drive on (DRIVE HERE!) is roadway coloured, the roadway NOT to drive on (DON'T DRIVE HERE!) is entirely covered by a continuous area of white road marking paint, several square yards. Missable it ain't.

I have seen it happen time and time again: Bloke in car in front gets to start of hairpin, executes a hard right ("Bloke in front! It ain't a right turn."), I do not follow him but carry straight on (on the roadway) into the hairpin and GO AROUND the hairpin. Of course, on the exit to the hairpin I have to stomp on my brake to stop my car going into the side door of the 'bloke in front' who is now stuck straddling the hairpin, and we all wait while he extricates himself.

I can't visualise this.

Any chance of a street view link?

Rob

[XFool]

I can't visualise this.

Any chance of a street view link?

Surely you can visualise a hair pin bend?

Wikipedia

Although the one in the tip is sharper than most of those pictured, as it is a tight, real 180 degree turn at the end of a single lane, central barrier divided roadway.

In other words, turn vehicle around by simply driving a U-turn, as intended. As opposed to trying to execute a 'right turn' at end of barrier, finding you can't and then having to turn vehicle around 'by means of forward and reverse gears'.