Rubbish trucks involved in 149 incidents throughout Auckland region since start of 2017

Tony Tuimavave and Jordan Sealy work their route around Te Atatu in December, 2017. Photo / Michael Craig

Almost 150 cars, letterboxes and fences have been damaged by Auckland rubbish collection trucks in the last 18 months.

The Herald can reveal 149 incidents were recorded from January 2017 to June 2018 during Auckland Council's rubbish and recycling kerbside collection service.

Auckland's waste management operation was the largest residential collection in the southern hemisphere with every road in the city serviced. Each day 300 bins are emptied per minute.

Throughout the central, south and north collection areas there were 99 car-related incidents and 50 "other incidents" which included damage to letterboxes and fences.

In the central area, 48 car incidents and 16 other incidents were recorded.

In the south was 30 car and 25 others, meanwhile, in the north, there were 21 car and nine others.

A taxi was crushed when hit by a rubbish truck bin arm in Milford last month. Photo / Olivia Moore

Those recorded resulted in proven claims of damage throughout the 18-month period and included accidents caused by members of the public as well as by rubbish truck drivers.

Auckland Council's general manager of Waste Solutions, Parul Sood said the number of collisions was small compared to the number of bins collected.

"Auckland Council's service collects approximately 165,000 bins every day – that's around 19,000 bins an hour, or 300 bins each minute.

"In relation to the scale of the service, these incidents happen very infrequently – this works out to be approximately one incident for every 600,000 bins collected," she said.

"We take every incident seriously and we work closely with our contractors to continuously improve collections and minimise the chance of damages taking place.

Sood added 180 rubbish trucks operated on the road at any one time and the drivers often came upon tricky situations on busy roads.

The figures come as the Herald revealed a rubbish truck crashed over a wall in St Heliers in April and smashed into two expensive European cars, writing both off.

Last month images were also released of a rubbish truck brought a bin crashing down on top of a Blue Bubble Taxi in Milford on Auckland's North Shore.

Auckland rubbish truck incidents:

Central
Car incidents – 48
Other incidents – 16

South
Car incidents – 30
Other incidents – 25

North
Car incidents – 21
Other incidents – 9