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CHISWICK LITTER PICK SUNDAY 22ND JANUARY 2023

Happy New Year Litter Pickers!   We are back this Sunday, meet outside Christ Church on Turnham Green at 2.30pm for about an hour, litter picking on the Green and surrounding residential streets.Then back to the Church by 3.30pm for Tea and Cake and a Chat.If you have your own gardening/protective gloves please bring them.

Mitra Alam ● 461d16 Comments

Dear Fellow ChiswickiansWould you like to join us on Sunday 26th February 2023?Meet at Christ Church Turnham Green at 2.30pm for an hour's litter pick then back to the Church for Yummy Cake, Tea and Chat

Mitra Alam ● 428d

In some parts of the country communities have come together to create community composting of garden waste.  It surprises me that there isn't more of this.  It is good to see Christmas trees being chipped locally so that they can be used as compost and to spread on paths.  It is apparently greener to do this than to buy and use an imported fake one which apparently needs to be used 12 times to be as green.  (And you've got to find somewhere to look after it well and where it is easy to get out from in all those intervening months.)

Philippa Bond ● 456d

Jim - there is always more we could learn as I'm sure you have discovered and will keep on discovering.  It also changes.  Corrugated cardboard is brilliant stuff that even furniture can be made out of - and this can be found online.  I really enjoy some of the changes that have been made in packaging to make it easier for us to all flatten and hopefully dispose of it carefully for recycling so that it can be used again. Just this Christmas I was looking at a box of booze and the way that the bottles had been packed. We don't often see exhibitions of that and any little films of the value of packaging.  I hate it when it is excessive and unnecessary and difficult to deal with but there is also brilliant innovation.  Remember how much of it used to be mixed - which is hard to recycle!The flytipping that has blighted our lives and still continues is a constant nightmare and I know that you followed up on some of the 'scallywags' who do this.  I wouldn't be as polite and understanding especially when it often such a  deliberate and lazy act in avoiding even trying to deal with something in a better way. Whether it is the lazy people who just get up and leave their picnic detritus (having brought it in bags or boxes when it was heavier) or the decorators whose half full and empty paint pots, spoilt buckets and paint trays and rollers are taken away from the clients' homes and offices and are then dumped and whose behaviour has lost the general public the convenience of supermarket recycling; it blights our neighbourhoods.A lot of this goes back to the law and the separation of  business waste and household waste under it. Householders pay Council Tax which covers some of it but businesses of any kind also need to pay for the disposal of their waste. Sometimes the two wastes are similar but sometimes definitely not especially in large quantities!This morning on the radio there was an item on a company making a packaging alternative to plastic essentially out of onion skins and for anyone who actually made their own bread sauce this Christmas or who makes rice pudding they will also have noticed the skin that forms on the top of it.

Philippa Bond ● 456d

" I've rescued a wrench and removed usable builders' materials but not had a means of passing them on."There is an ever changing scene and continuous efforts in trying and achieving or sadly failing to achieve more and easier ways to reuse (higher up the waste hierarchy than recycle) as well as recycle to keep the world's resources in continuous use rather than finite disposal.I noticed this just the other day when looking up something up:https://www.spacehive.com/re-made-in-park-royal?searchText=building%20materials%20reuse You can look up your local area to find out how and what communities are doing to improve their areas.  Just put your  interest or local area in the box at the top of the www.spacehive.com page. 

Philippa Bond ● 456d

Denis,Thank you for your message!  Several passers-by thanked us for our efforts.Yes it was cold, but it's a "heart-warming" experience.  We had so many young people join us - as I've said many a time, testimony to the community spirit that thrives in Chiswick

Mitra Alam ● 456d

I've seen Mongolian horsemen pick-up litter on the gallop so why not from a fast moving bicycle. After all thousands are up and down CHR every day. Apparently.Problem solved.

Adrian Irving ● 457d

Yes ..well done to the volunteers.It must be soul destroying to handle the clutter left around.I'm grateful to Joanne for her detailed explanation.

Jim Lawes ● 457d

To the posse of volunteers who turned up yesterday on a cold Sunday afternoon and gave of their time to clear the dirt and detritus surrounding the green at Christ Church, and nearby roads, I offer my thanks which I'm sure is reciprocated throughout Chiswick.

Denis I. Fox ● 457d

That's appalling Guy if you don't know the difference between Card (cereal boxes and the like) and corrugated  cardboard (e-flute, double walled etc).No wonder residents are equally clueless. There used to be a Brentford outfit called BRAG...was that suppose to be educational in the field of recycling?No wonder lorry loads of recycling used to travel over to carton mills in Gravesend and at Taplow..only to.be turned away because of clueless contamination.

Jim Lawes ● 460d

If Steve said that it  was more than 5 years ago as he knew quite well that NOTHING goes to landfill. I genuinely know a lot about this because it's been an important element of my job for 5 years, during which our performance has improved greatly.Flytipping has very little to do with recycling: I have also committed to reduce flytipping by 25% this administration and the unofficial info suggests it is likely to achieve that in the first run.I don't know any difference between card and cardboard -perhaps you can enlighten me. I know how much we get from recyclers from card/board and what we get for paper, and that's why I like paper better.Our head of recycling is a female, as is the ops director of our contractor. I would struggle to see any difference in performance, they are most excellent (and both know that we don't send anything to landfill!)

Guy Lambert ● 460d

I expect Stevec Urran has it all compacted to provide power supplies for his Sontaran battle cruiser.

Richard Greenhough ● 460d

Jim,Can I comment as a regular litter picker in this Turnham Green group? The litter that we pick up does indeed contain some items that could have been recycled and it bothers me as, like you, I try to do the best I can first to reduce what I buy that needs to be recycled, then make sure it goes into recycling.  Unfortunately, a lot of what we pick up is in a disgusting state. Cans can be filled with mud, for example. I've dug out bottles full of urine. A very lovely evening dress dumped behind a bush was covered in mushy leaves; it would need to be washed before it could be recycled. I've rescued a wrench and removed usable builders' materials but not had a means of passing them on. Abandoned food seems to be a common chuck round here, whether it's partly eaten or not even opened and still in date ready meals or pots of dips. Plus a lot of what we pick up is fiddly stuff that would end up in waste, anyway: used tissues, plastic ties, laminated posters and countless numbers of cigarette ends as well as lazily chucked bags of dog poo. Now that we can recycle soft plastics (at the Co-op and Sainsbury's) I wish I could divert the many small plastic carrier bags, crisp packets, baby food pouches, etc, but they are usually filthy. You have identified some of the barriers to recycling; there are others including not providing the information needed by residents who already do more than the basics; not providing information in other languages, even though this is a multi-cultural borough; and, still, not providing recycling for residents living in flats above shops. Attempts to stop littering don't seem to work. I vividly remember the driver who tossed his empty drinks can and cigarette packet onto the road and, when I asked him to pick them up, said, "No, we pay other people to do that". Blacks sack waste and contaminated recycling used to be sent to landfill but the landfill tax has been a deterrent. Hounslow's waste is diverted to the West London Waste Authority which burns it for energy. More info is in the links below: https://www.hounslow.gov.uk/recyclingdestinationshttps://westlondonwaste.gov.uk/about-us/energy-from-waste-faqs

Joanna Biddolph ● 460d

I recently read a statement from Steve Curren the ex- leader of the Council (a possibly out of date statement)... that if batches of recycling were considered to be too contaminated they would be sent to landfill.If Hounslow's recycling score is only some 35% or less there must be an awful lot of "litter+" that is dumped undergroundI regard myself at being fairly knowledgable on recycling behavior over many many many years.Check "brentford flytipper" on google for example.It is easy to collect masses of photos about household dumping around the Borough.Filthy recycling bins, vague details of whats what. Half of residents don't know the difference between card and cardboard.I recall now that Steve Curren mentioned about the language barrier in Hounslow which exacerbates bad recycling.The recycling shambles at Sainsburys Chiswick merely follows the closure at MorrisonsBrentford and Homebase at Gillette Corner and the Osterley Tescos.Best to put a female in charge?

Jim Lawes ● 461d

Nothing from Hounslow goes to landfill (except a tiny amount of hazardous stuff like asbestos)

Guy Lambert ● 461d

Jim, I will have to check.  I do know that Hounslow Highways collect the bags at the end of the litter pick.I do feel, PERSONALLY, that collecting litter, especially non consumable, and non compostable items which can be consumed by wildlife, or cause injury to both wildlife and people, are best removed from our pavements and green spaces.    When children join us on these litter picks they are often shocked by what is collected and they in turn learn to dispose of waste responsibly.You would find it disturbing to see what is discarded so casually by so many people.

Mitra Alam ● 461d

That's great news.My question on a previous thread on this subject was not answered.When you fill your bags with the wide assortment of litter... is it ever sorted and segregated.(ie decollated)Is there a possibility that all your filled bags will be thrown into landfill?

Jim Lawes ● 461d