Thanet District Council has taken delivery of 11 new open-back waste collection vehicles with the aim of improving the efficiency of collections across the district.
The new vehicles have a load capacity of almost 10 tonnes compared with just over 6 tonnes for some of the fleet that they are replacing. This will reduce the frequency of trips to the disposal site and save time and mileage.
Last June Thanet council agreed to spend £2.2million on the new fleet.
From Monday, March 29, residents will have their mixed dry plastic recycling and paper/card recycling collected at different times of the day by separate crews.
There will be no changes to residents’ collection days.
Residents should leave their bins, boxes and bags out until 4pm as the new trucks may be collecting later in the day than usual.
Cllr Steve Albon, Cabinet Member for Operational Services at Thanet District Council said: “Our new fleet of waste collection vehicles can accommodate greatly increased loads compared to the previous split-back models that collected both waste and recycling at the same time.
“This will allow them to stay on the road longer before having to travel back to the transfer station so it is more efficient in terms of both time and fuel. Other benefits include reduced spillage and reduced maintenance costs.
“There will be no changes to resident’s collections days but we are asking people to keep their recycling out until 4pm before reporting a missed collection.”
The new vehicles are equipped with 360-degree camera systems and cyclist detection and warning technology. They are also rear steer which means they will be able to get into some of the more inaccessible roads. They are all open-back which improves resilience as the whole fleet is now interchangeable.
The roll-out of the new waste fleet coincides with the end of the existing vehicle’s economic life. These were bought in 2013 and can no longer be economically maintained. The expected lifespan of a refuse collection vehicle is about seven years due to the heavy nature of the work and type of load they carry.
Lets hope paper is collected first because if not there will be paper flying around everywhere as the bags are not the best to close.
Never had any issues, try to put heavier items such as magazines & newspapers on top of anything like shredding & till receipts.
From Monday, March 29, residents will have their mixed dry plastic recycling and paper/card recycling collected at different times of the day by separate crews.
Right at the moment recycling and paper are collected at the same time and the binmen put the red paper recycling bag into the dry mix recycling bins. This is great as it stops the red bags being blown all over the place. Works well.
Now TDC are collecting at different times so I guess this means the red bags will be blowing all over the place if collected before the recycling bins. It doesnt say in this report but I guess the buns will be emptied first so the red bags can be put in the recycling bins to stop them blowing all over the place.
Problem with that is that the red bag could then up being emptied into the vehicle when the blue bin is emptied, assuming it is even done in that order.
We lost our red bag when instead of removing the big cardboard box inside the bag, which contained all our paper recycling, the red bag was slung into the lorry; presumably it was too much trouble to take the box out first!
Hopefully, if not perhaps TDC should replace the red bags with the red lid recycling bins I have seen some people have.
that would be to simple for TDC but would of course be an added cost but maybe a cost-saving in the long term
Anyone can have a red recycling bin. Just give TDC £48 and wait for a few months.
Yeah the red bins are at a one off cost of £48.00. I much prefer this to the bags.
red bins are great if you have plenty of space; but surely they are overkill and an obstrucion for a lot of people; why can’t they put a couple of them in parks and other public places where we can all make use of them?
Unfortunately if the Council had red topped bins for paper in. For the public to use in parks etc. They would just be filled with household rubbish and dogs mess, by Joe Public.
Tony, this Joe Public sounds like a pretty smart guy and he always wins. The council is terrified of him and he gets to dictate council policy. Perhaps it’s about time the council sharpened up and put the bins in sensible places with good lighting and supervision and locked them up after working hours.
You have to pay for the red lid bins£45 TDC quoted
Not everyone can have a Bin if they don’t have a front garden, the Red bags can be taken indoors! I once fixed a small vertical strip of Velcro to hold the Red bag lid better, but the Bin men refused to empty it, Duurh! This is what is needed to help prevent paper blowing out of the Red Bags. Instead of just a slim horizontal strip of Velcro to close the lid, which is pretty well useless, also have a vertical strip, too easy I suppose!
And not everyone can have a red bag either. If you live on a double yellow line or any other route that the council chooses to exclude then you are banned from recycling regardless of your beliefs.
Thankfully we will not have to hear that annoying squeaking any longer.
Didn’t know Ben Dover had a twin brother.
The red bags for recycling are a bit of a bug bare ,the binmen drag them across the roads ,this causes the bottoms to tear then TDC have the cheek to charge for new ones.
That’s alright then – shouldn’t be anymore waste problems – unless the same crews are under the same managers but in shiny new trucks?
Do they have a broom and shovel on the back like they used to, or are they still going to leave any dropped rubbish on the floor?
So these vehicles have a lifespan of seven years. Hopefully that gives us enough time to change enough mindsets to make 10-ton non-recycling waste trucks a thing of the past.
kathy any information on how many of the old fleet were 6 tonners and as such how many of the new vehicles are actually of increased capacity. Are the collection crews “in house” and existing staff or is it a case of a new contractor taking over. Also is this change connected with the loss of the waste paper and card bins from around the Isle? And if i understand correctly there are going to be two collections on each round on the same day? If so even though the trucks are bigger, they’ll still be collecting from the same number of addresses bar the extra ones possible due to the extra time saved from fewer dump visits ( for those larger wagons in excess of the previous number of larger wagons) . Seems to me that overall collection costs are likely to increase as it’ll need additional crews. At which point does the costs of collection outweigh the benefits of recycling?
kathy any information on how many of the old fleet were 6 tonners and as such how many of the new vehicles are actually of increased capacity. Are the collection crews “in house” and existing staff or is it a case of a new contractor taking over. Also is this change connected with the loss of the waste paper and card bins from around the Isle? And if i understand correctly there are going to be two collections on each round on the same day? If so even though the trucks are bigger, they’ll still be collecting from the same number of addresses bar the extra ones possible due to the extra time saved from fewer dump visits ( for those larger wagons in excess of the previous number of larger wagons) . Seems to me that overall collection costs are likely to increase as it’ll need additional crews. At which point does the costs of collection outweigh the benefits of recycling?
Wonderful – hope someone tells the rubbish collectors that red bags aren’t rubbish. Mine was taken a month ago and TDC say there is a 4 month waiting list.
No, it’s not caused by covid the list has been that long for years. Just total incompetence by TDC.
I got told by one of the staff that he couldn’t take my bags on the recycling truck last time around my area even though id spent time separating cans from plastic bottles and putting them in a bag so it was lighter for them but he told me that he couldn’t take it cos it was in a black bag…..so this time round ive separated the cans from the bottles put them in bags that you can almost see through I wonder if they take them this time round now there is double the amount of waste…..prat!!
Now we will have 3 Collection in a day One for blue bin one for Paper card and one for food where’s the savings on fuel environment Well done TDC
So keep the bins out until 4pm before reporting it hasn’t been emptied?
Why send two lorries to do one lorries job?
I’ve reported my food waste bin not emptied 7 times in 3 months. The reply is we won’t reply but it will be done in 7 days. Yeah the next time it can be missed, which they did for a month.
“Will be done in 7 days” a convenient way of saying we’ll do nothing about it and hopefully it’ll get collected next week. Utter joke. Can’t do the job properly and no embarrassment about not putting errors right.
All the time the waste and recycling service remains led by incompetent senior management with ineffective political scrutiny and challenge by elected members then it doesn’t matter how many shiny new toys they buy.
The streets will remain filthy and missed bin collections will remain amongst the worst in Kent.
How much have they cost?
What is the resale value of any trucks that are no longer needed?
Are they environmentally friendly? (Horse and cart?)
Did TDC try Alibaba first?
https://www.alibaba.com/showroom/garbage-truck-10-tons.html
Will the crews have a dedicated litter picker, road sweeper, bag tethered following up the truck?
More likely the vehicles are on some sort of lease deal along the lines of a PCP plan and so just handed back at end of the term, gives a degree of financial certainty , which arguably is better than outright purchase and issues trying to offload them later with the unknowns involved. Makes budgetting much easier
Islington has some very nice electric waste trucks, were these environmentally friendly alternatives not affordable with 22 million pounds?
https://issuu.com/terbergrosroca/docs/new_trrg_magazine_issue_allpage_18dec.2020?fr=sY2YyMjI1MTUyNTg
Probably would be with 22 million , but reading of the story is a 2.2 million spend.
At 235,000 GBP’s inc. VAT each which comes to 2,586.263 GBP they have cost a bit over 2.2 million. No-one has said what the vehicles that are being replaced are worth at resale, or indeed why the vehicles had the same weaknesses and this wasn’t taken up with the manufacturer!
Great to see an investment in new trucks and from a British vehicle manufacturer too. The trucks still look to be in the 26 tonne GVW (Gross Vehicle Weight) class as the existing fleet but due to the increased drive by vehicle manufacturers and body builders has meant they can have an increased load capacity due to lighter yet equally durable materials being used in the construction. Plus they will be Euro 6 unlike the current fleet that is mostly made up of Euro 5 vehicles (63 plates). On the subject of Red Bags I opted for a Red Bin over a Red Bag due to the increased capacity and durability over the bag. Did once see something funny involving a Red Bag when someone came up on to the top deck of the route 9 I was on in Broadstairs using one as a shopping bag.
Also further to my last post having a rear steer axle on the truck along with reducing weight and helping with the turning circle of the truck should help lower tyre scrub due to the rear most axle steering unlike the current ones that have a twin fixed axle set up on axles 2 and 3 of the vehicle.
Jon R – you really should try to get out more.
Will that make a haphazard service improve?
Kathy Bailes, will these new trucks be equipped with tracking devices or is that too much to expect from a £2.2M budget? The technology already exists to track our parcel deliveries, so why can’t we use the same technology to forecast when our waste will be collected?
When proven and zero-emission electric RCV’s are also available from Dennis, why did TDC not chose them?
As diesel refinement and combustion only adds to carbon emissions, TDC cabinet have chosen to worsen the declared climate emergency. Why?
I have listened to Dennis’s sales presentation and learnt the following:
1. Their eRCV is available with all the options of their normal diesel RCV i.e. as purchased by TDC.
2. Two rounds of collecting 10 tons each, is done more quickly by the eRCV, due to its superior acceleration.
3. The high battery energy density and regenerative breaking, enable proven service, with 20% battery capacity remaining on return to the depot
4. A fully specified eRCV costs £430,000 whilst an RCV costs £210,000.
5. Due to fuel and maintenance savings, the total cost of ownership over 7 to 8 years is expected to be the same! That projection is based on currently low diesel costs, which may well increase, and charging costs are likely to fall as renewable generation increases, making the eRCVs cheaper in the long run‼
I must repeat that the total cost of ownership over 7 to 8 years is expected to be the same, yet the eRCV will have created no pollution and no emissions during its life.
TDC cabinet, how can you possibly justify adding carbon to the atmosphere from 11 RCVs for the next 7 years, when you could have chosen zero-emissions and zero pollution⁉