The Lemon Fool

My local council has decided that my black bin, blue bin and two brown bins is not sufficiently complicated, so they've just foisted a green bin on me, along with a devilishly complicated pick-up schedule, which will result in all my near neighbours having different coloured bins out on collection days.
And yet again, we seem to have a wheelie-bin designer who has no idea of the requirements for a wheelie bin, a manufacturer who exerts no control over the designer, and a council procurement process which presumably buys the lowest price bin with no consideration of performance.

Is it really so difficult to design a wheelie bin with a convex rather than concave lid, so that I and the bin do not suffer a flood of water whenever the lid is raised?

--kiloran (in a crappy mood after a few days of downloading and reinstalling all my software on my new laptop. Will this ever end?)

kiloran wrote:Is it really so difficult to design a wheelie bin with a convex rather than concave lid, so that I and the bin do not suffer a flood of water whenever the lid is raised?

The mind boggles! Really concave, or flat-but-sags-in-the-middle?

We have convex lids. And fewer bins than you.

A concave lid allows for the secure placement of a bag of recyclable clothing, should you have any to put out that week.

Sodden clothing is a small price to pay for doing your bit, surely?

Watis

UncleEbenezer wrote:

kiloran wrote:Is it really so difficult to design a wheelie bin with a convex rather than concave lid, so that I and the bin do not suffer a flood of water whenever the lid is raised?

The mind boggles! Really concave, or flat-but-sags-in-the-middle?

We have convex lids. And fewer bins than you.

Two bins are OK with lids allowing rain to run off, one is definitely designed to be very concave, the new one is definitely designed to be slightly concave, but it does sag a bit so makes things even worse.

When I got the really concave one, I sent emails to the manufacturer and the council but didn't even get an acknowledgement. They presumably thought they were dealing with a loony (can't argue with that!).

--kiloran

I'd just settle for them putting the empty bins back in the little stockade we've made for them. We've had two warnings from the council now about our bins being left in the road (our drive enters a very narrow country lane) but despite building an open fronted bin parking area the bin men or waste disposal operatives whatever they're calling themselves this week, just fling them in the general direction of the area and hope for the best. Our drive is about three quarters of a mile long so we don't always hear the bin lorry arriving. We take the bins down there, at least 4 each week, so we're doing our bit but it really is annoying when they can't be bothered to return them properly.

R6

Rhyd6 wrote:I'd just settle for them putting the empty bins back in the little stockade we've made for them. We've had two warnings from the council now about our bins being left in the road (our drive enters a very narrow country lane) but despite building an open fronted bin parking area the bin men or waste disposal operatives whatever they're calling themselves this week, just fling them in the general direction of the area and hope for the best. Our drive is about three quarters of a mile long so we don't always hear the bin lorry arriving. We take the bins down there, at least 4 each week, so we're doing our bit but it really is annoying when they can't be bothered to return them properly.

R6

Warnings?? What law is being broken and what are the threatened penalties.

And surely your defence is 'Not me' and tell the Council to send the warning to the bin company.

I got a label on my plastics bin saying that they were no longer prepared to empty it because it was "damaged".

Yes, you cretins, it's broken now. It was all right yesterday, before your gang of corporation baboons came along and slammed it against the truck so hard that it split from end to end.

They're the same baboons who wrenched my grey rubbish bin about so much that the plastic wheels came right off the axle. I fixed that one by jamming them back onto the shaft with a couple of well-placed nails. So now I expect you'll threaten me with action for "interfering with council property"?

Grrrr.

BJ

bungeejumper wrote:I got a label on my plastics bin saying that they were no longer prepared to empty it because it was "damaged".

Yes, you cretins, it's broken now. It was all right yesterday, before your gang of corporation baboons came along and slammed it against the truck so hard that it split from end to end.

They're the same baboons who wrenched my grey rubbish bin about so much that the plastic wheels came right off the axle. I fixed that one by jamming them back onto the shaft with a couple of well-placed nails. So now I expect you'll threaten me with action for "interfering with council property"?

Grrrr.

BJ

This reply is not really in the spirit of Bitter Lemons as it has a happy ending.
Here in kent I have had two bins badly damaged over the years and a quick phone call to Serco has seen them replaced within days with the old ones taken away. Give it a try with whoever services your area.

Though I'm quite happy with the three bins supplied by my Council (even though finding somewhere to put them is a bit of an issue) I get annoyed about the concave lid thing simply because they do cascade water into your recycling bin in particular when it is especially emphasised to be for DRY recyclables only. However I have to admit that they were probably were not concave when I received them. The thing is that my three cats find them very useful look out posts and I fear the concaveness may be due to them. They also sit on top on my van but being made of metal that vehicle stands up to it better.

Like most products these days , designs have to be fashionable with function an afterthought.

Besides the design of bins, the ownership should be clearer. When a wheelie bin is allocated to a household, it should be embossed with a clear abbreviated address of the household to which it has been allocated.. Our street has several orphaned bins, sometimes damaged, which are left unclaimed on the pavement or on forecourts of unloved properties. Sometimes I have to recover ours from quite far away.

bruncher wrote:Besides the design of bins, the ownership should be clearer. When a wheelie bin is allocated to a household, it should be embossed with a clear abbreviated address of the household to which it has been allocated.

Ownership? Dunno about that, our bins have an embossed logo that says they remain the property of the council. All of which will only encourage certain malefactors to treat all bins as their collective property, especially when they're filling up our green garden waste bins with their surplus cans and bottles. The bastards.

The answer, surely, would be to append a few well-chosen dustbin stickers that will embarrass your neighbours into making quite sure that your bins will never be seen outside their houses. Suggestions:

"Property of Poochy and Squiggles"

"Go Corbyn!"

"Clinical waste only"


You get the idea.

BJ

Wheelie bins? Think yourselves lucky. Just before I left Brighton they did away with bin collections and introduced street bins. Communal bins situated at various points where nearby residents can deposit their refuse. The council then only has 1 bin to empty rather than many from individual houses.

It's partly automated, the truck pulls up and connects to the bin which is lifted, emptied and then replaced. Oh how efficient.

Only it's not. Some people are too lazy to open the hatch and deposit their waste inside the bin so they just drop bags outside the bin. The rats and seagulls love that. DIY refuse like old kitchen units get smashed and dropped in the bins, filling them very quickly. Not allowed obviously but you would wouldn't you? OK you wouldn't but plenty do.

The council emptied the bins regularly but they had miscalculated how often that should be so the bins overflowed. Now you have a choice , you can walk to the next bin or just drop your back outside the full bin. Guess what people did.

I'm sure you can imagine numerous other reasons communal bins were a bad idea. Of course you can, only for some reason the council couldn't. They never thought people would drop rubbish outside the bins so the drivers emptied the bin but did nothing about refuse near the bin, it's not their job. They never thought bins might get damaged so that rats and seagulls could get into the bins for the food waste. They never thought placing the bins on yellow lines near junctions might cause a hazard. They never thought youngsters with a few drinks in them might decide to push half full bins into the middle of the road on their way home from a club.

I've no idea if they ever got the system sorted. I left the city.

Think yourselves lucky if you have wheelie bins.

sg31 wrote:Wheelie bins? Think yourselves lucky.

Bah. Wheelie bins may be fine for the big house with ample driveway space, but they're a true PITA for others. Brighton's system is far-and-away the lesser evil. Even my dad - who lives in Brighton and is a lifelong curmudgeon - loves it.

That Brighton system also appears to be the norm (universal?) in Italy, where I lived several years with it.

UncleEbenezer wrote:Bah. Wheelie bins may be fine for the big house with ample driveway space, but they're a true PITA for others.

UE, I seem to recall you saying that you have a very long flight of steps up to your front door?

BJ

bungeejumper wrote:

UncleEbenezer wrote:Bah. Wheelie bins may be fine for the big house with ample driveway space, but they're a true PITA for others.

UE, I seem to recall you saying that you have a very long flight of steps up to your front door?

BJ

And wheelie bins are fine here[1]. Unlike so many of my previous addresses.

[1] Except when they acquire deeply unpleasant mystery loads. Or go walkabout. Or ...

We have a black, a brown, a blue and two green wheelie bins plus a caddy. It works reasonably well in our housing scheme, where there is room to store the bins. Many years ago I lived briefly on the first floor of a 10-storey flat. In the hall (on each level) there was a rubbish chute down which you dropped the rubbish, to be collected in huge bins in the basement. A bottle launched from the 10th storey whistled loudly as it passed by, and crashed explosively as it terminated.