Western Bay rural recycling trailers now on winter schedule

One of the trailers helping rural residents recycle in the Western Bay.

Western Bay’s mobile recycling trailers Recyclosaurus Rex and Sustainabox are changing their schedule for winter.

After a successful summer of recycling, Western Bay of Plenty District Council’s two mobile recycling trailers are changing to a new roster tailored to the community’s preference.

In their first six months of going out to rural depots, the mobile recycling trailers have built up a group of users who drop off recyclables every fortnight.

Primarily, these are rural residents who don’t qualify for kerbside collection services and have to travel a long way to get to a recycling facility.

After a period of settling in, users were surveyed to understand when and how often they drop off their recyclables.

The new roster is based on the responses.

Mobile recycling trailers will continue to rotate between the existing locations on a fortnightly roster each Saturday at the following times and locations. The only change is a reduction in hours to optimise staff time and still deliver a convenient service.

Last Saturday a trailer was at BP Pongakawa on SH2 and on Saturday, April 8, a trailer will be at Te Ranga School, 1492 Te Matai Rd. The hours of operation are 10am-noon and times and dates at these locations will alternate.

Operations manager Kerrie Little says the rural recycling service has been a success, and is doing what it set out to do — support rural communities with better recycling options.

“We’re proud of what this service has achieved. Every weekend our team are out chatting to people dropping off their recycling and it’s clear they appreciate the service.

“And ka rawe [awesome] to the community for making the effort to recycle. They have embraced the waste minimisation challenge and we’re proud to meet them halfway by taking the trailers a little closer to them.”

A reminder of the dates is available via the council’s Antenno app.

The mobile recycling service was launched in October.

The names for the trailers were chosen via a public competition on the council’s Facebook page.

The trailers were purchased with grants from the Waste Minimisation Fund and the Glass Packaging Forum.