Bin night fails and bin perving – ripping at the soul of my hood

Recently my local council, Hawkesbury City Council made a massive change to the daily life of its citizens, or at least one day a week anyway. Now this article isn’t about bagging the council, it’s more about how one little change can throw an entire neighbourhood into chaos. 

They changed bin night.

We were made aware of this back on the 26^th of August in a perfectly clear and concise letter. But to be frank, f+%ked if I know what happens when.

The letter stated:

“Residents who already receive morning collections will not have any changes to their collection times,”

“The changes to evening general waste collections are being made following a review by Council.”

It goes on:

“Council’s review of the general waste service collection schedules established that morning and afternoon collections would provide safer work conditions and improved customer service. In light of this, all general waste collections will be conducted during the day in order to maintain an efficient, safe and reliable general waste collection to all residents.”

Ok, I’m down with that. Easy right? Here’s a little more…

“Only areas that currently have evening waste collection times will change, which will apply to around 50% of Hawkesbury residents. For residents who had evening collections, the general waste will now be collected earlier in the day on the next business day,”

“For instance, if the general waste was collected Thursday evening, it will now be collected on Friday during the day. Residents will be required to put their general waste bin out before 4am on the day of collection.”

Council’s General Manager, Peter Conroy explained.

“The new waste collection schedule will enable Waste Management staff to cover landfill during the day,” Mr Conroy said.

“This will also improve safety for waste management staff because morning and afternoon collections will allow all waste to be visually checked before being covered.“

The following changes will apply:

• Sunday evening will change to Monday
• Monday evening will change to Tuesday
• Tuesday evening will change to Wednesday
• Wednesday evening will change to Thursday
• Thursday evening will change to Friday.

This has led to mass confusion in my street, point three applies to us. But way down the bottom of the letter it says:

“There will be no changes to green waste or recycling service collection times.”

So, what is happening is mass bin perving. I see one bloke* put his yellow one out, I think he’s probably looped in and follow. Some other bloke* sees what I’ve done and thinks and does the same.

But then there’s another guy* who’s run with the green and I immediately think, that poor guy he’s going to regret that. Then after a day or two me and the other bloke* still have our yellow bins sitting idle on the street.

As I can show you via some pictures captured by my Fort Knox rivalling security system, last week I refused to bring the yellow bin in.

Plus, at one point I left all three out. You see I filled my green bin to the brim with this cactus style plant that the previous owners must have thought was native to the area. Honestly despite requiring a chainsaw to take down, it’s still growing in the bin because it hasn’t been emptied for three weeks.

This week, I’ve looked even further up the street and this sheep-like behaviour is rife and still continuing. There has to be another way. Shouldn’t Neighbourhood Watch deal with this, like just come up and knock on the door and say “Mate WTAF?”

Plus last week old mate* next door put his red bin out way too early. That sowed more seeds of doubt in my mind.

Have you ever heard the rumble of the truck and done the bolt? I have, well I used to. But unless there’s now a stealth garbage struck; I’m missing it. 

For now, I’m pretty sure I have it right this week. But isn’t it embarrassing that one little scheduling change can alter mine and everyone’s routines?

*All names have been changed to bloke, guy or old mate to protect their identity.