Recycling

Recycling

OK so todays rant is going to be about recycling. 

Now whilst I would guess that most of us totally support recycling; what I am about to RANT about is recycling done incorrectly. 

I live in a communal block of 12 properties.  We have a communal car park (where every owner has a numbered space), we have 2 communal bins where we can all chuck our rubbish, we have a communal courtyard which includes a whirly gig where any of us can hang out washing.

....................But what we don't have.................... is communal recycling.

Communal recycling would be great, but at the moment it is not an option for a variety of reasons.  Every property has 3 horrible flimsy bags that are supposed to be put out once a fortnight for collection.  We got these horrible flimsy bags about 5 years ago and at that point I stopped doing any recycling where I live.  (NB - I take my recycling to public recycling points).  There are two reasons for this:

1)  My house is small.  I have no room to house 3 bags of recycling for two weeks.

2)  When I first got my 3 flimsy bags (to replace the one plastic box with a lid that I could keep outside) I tried to do the recycling how the council wanted.  I put them out in the allotted spot on the allotted day and then I went to work.  When I came back from work, two of my flimsy bags were in the middle of the road and the other one was in the middle of the car  park???

At that point I gave up recycling at my property and decided to deal with my recycling myself.  I now go to public recycling points myself and have absolutely nothing to do with any recycling where I live.

.....................So here starts my RANT......................

One of my neighbours (who shall remain nameless) decided to put a load of recycling boxes/bags in the communal courtyard.  Now whilst I appreciate that her motives for doing this were admirable, the reality of this is less so.  Just how stupid is it to put out a load of recycling boxes when there is no plan in place for the collection of these?

In the summer half of the 12 homes here are holiday lets (including the said neighbours).  I know for a fact that 3 of those holiday homes have info in their information folders to say that there is no recycling facilities at the property.  BUT...................... if you were on holiday and saw that there were recycling boxes/bags in the communal area what would you do????.........................

a)  Chuck all your recycling stuff in there

b)  Dispose of your recycling stuff yourself

I know what I would do - I'd take the easy option and chuck all my recycling in the nearest recycling boxes??!!  And who cares how mixed up it is???

....................And here lies the problem..........................  The holiday makers haven't a clue when the recycling is going to be collected, and even if they do; they're on holiday so they're hardly likely to want to sort through all the rubbish, sort it out and then put it in the correct place for collection.  The neighbour who put all the recycling boxes/bags in the communal courtyard is renting out her place and although is somewhere local, hasn't bothered to come back on recycling day to sort out all the mess, so yet again (we had the same problem last year) it's down to myself and another neighbour to sort everything out.

Well it's not on.  Last summer after spending six weeks sorting through everyone's rubbish I made an 'executive' decision (when I found a used babies nappy) to get rid of all the recycling boxes/bags and stacked them up in the corner of the communal courtyard.  My neighbour who helped me sort them out agreed with me.  And let's just be clear here - we both do our OWN recycling so really should not have had to spend all summer sorting out everyone else's recycling/rubbish just because another neighbour had left a load of recycling boxes in a communal area and then buggered off?????(

This year I rebelled!!!

Took photos of all the rubbish (as above), sent email to 'said neighbour' telling her I was going to chuck the whole lot in the bin and copied all the other owners into the email to tell them why.  As far as I'm concerned communication is really important so I wanted everyone to know why I was doing this.  ...................I saw a rat sitting on top of the recycling boxes??!!

Obviously she wasn't happy.  Ranted and raved at me a bit.  OK ranted and raved at me a lot?!!!  

But hey ho, that's life.

At the end of the day........................  I really do think recycling is important.......................  But only if it is done correctly????