Residents of a Lurgan housing development have called on ABC Council to get its act together after “stinking” bins filled with food and garden waste and crawling with maggots remain un-emptied after almost a month.
Despite repeated calls by those living in Forest Glade, just off the Antrim Road, they say no effort has been made to solve ongoing issues which has left all there fed up and frustrated.
There are dozens of homes within the development and, when bins are not emptied, it has been blamed on the bin lorry’s inability to access Forest Glade due to parking at a local children’s nursery.
But one resident, who did not wish to be named, told Armagh I : “That’s not our fault. Why should we suffer as a result?”
He added: “It’s happened on a number of occasions. The green bins get emptied OK but, on a number of occasions, the brown bins aren’t emptied and the council has said it’s because the brown bin lorry is a bigger lorry and, because the nursery staff and people coming out of it are parking on both sides of the road at the junction at the top of the development, the brown bin lorry can’t get down.
“Sometimes what happens is that they’ll try another run a couple of days later but our brown bin was supposed to emptied two weeks ago.
“The brown bin was last emptied four weeks ago, on the 17th of August. The 31st of August, which was the Bank Holiday, they were still operating, and that’s the one they’ve missed. By the time they empty this on Monday, if they empty it, it’ll have been a month.”
The resident said some of those living in Forest Glade had contacted ABC Council and were told letters would be sent out to the nursery school.
But he believes the issue could be resolved by simply altering the timing of the collection.
“I said to them the green bin lorry went down at half seven and the brown bin lorry went down at half eight,” he added. “I said it’s a regular occurrence.
“The nursery used to be a house and it was sold and the nursery put an extension out the back. So at the front of the nursery, they have got a little bit of tarmac where a few cars can park. I think what they do, though, is they keep it free for parents dropping kids in and out. So the staff have to park their cars.
“They’re parking outside the nursery, which is the little road that leads from the main road into our development. Sometimes they end up maybe parking both sides. Now, I’ve never had a situation where, we can’t get in and out.
“If the brown bin’s going to come down at about half eight, that’s going to be peak time for people coming and going to that nursery.
“It was suggested, and it was passed on to one of their supervisors in the waste disposal department, can you not just consider maybe the timing of it, given that this is a known area? Maybe that’s the situation that annoyed them not to come round at all.”
With no movement, residents are now waiting to see what will happen on Monday, whether or not bins are in fact lifted.
And for them, they describe it as a public health issue and one which the council cannot continue to ignore.
“Those brown bins are where we put our food waste and our garden waste and the bins are stinking,” added the resident.
“At the end of the day, as ratepayers, it’s not our fault that you have a problem getting access to the development. There’s 44 houses in a new development here and it’s not our problem. Why should we suffer here?
“You should be trying to get that bin lorry either down an hour earlier or you should be coming down here the next day.
“We’re still waiting. Some of the neighbours have taken their bins in. Some of us have still got our bins out because they won’t give you a guarantee when the bin lorry will scoot round and you’d hate to miss it.
“So our brown bin, with food waste, garden waste, hasn’t been emptied since the 17th of August. It is a public health issue. I haven’t lifted the lid on my bin, to be honest, to look into it, but some of my neighbours were saying they could see the maggots and all. It’s got a wee bit cooler the last couple of days, but it’s been quite warm up to recently.
“Our bins are emptied on a Monday. I put mine out on a Sunday night. In fact, I rushed two weeks ago, that was the Bank Holiday weekend, on the Sunday night to get my garden cut to get the grass into the bin for it to be emptied. Sure it’s still sitting out there nearly two weeks later.
“Who wants their bin sitting at the front of the house for two weeks? Nobody does. It takes the whole look off it, never mind the fact of the smell and all those bins are absolutely rotten.
“I’ve a good mind to ask them, they should have an obligation when this bin’s been emptied to send somebody around to clean them. But of course, what they’re doing is they are palming us all off with, ‘ It’s the nursery’. That’s not our problem. Us ratepayers shouldn’t have to be inconvenienced because you’ve got a problem with the nursery.
“You see if all the neighbours took their bins up onto the road there and emptied them all on the road – which we wouldn’t do – but if we did, how long would the council take to come down and clear that up? They’d be out within an hour.”
The irate resident said they were “up against bureaucracy” and effectively beating their heads off a brick wall. Emails sent to council officials sourced from the local authority’s own website had not been answered too.
“It’s ridiculous,” he fumed. “It’s very frustrating. You’re paying your rates. Are they unaccountable or what? Are they accountable to anybody?
“Some of us were saying the other day, I bet you when the bin lorry comes around they’ll probably say, I think the bins are too heavy, because they’ve sunk down and some people have been able to get their grass in it. These people can be awkward when they want to.
“I just think with council, it’s a known issue. There’s been a couple of times this summer where we haven’t had our bins emptied on time and they have come around maybe another day, you just don’t know when, so you just have to leave your bin at the front.
“But for some reason, this time, and maybe it’s actually the cynic in me says, because we have been phoning and asking and complaining about this, has somebody just decided to hell with them?
“It’s just ridiculous. A lot of the neighbours are getting really frustrated by the whole thing, including myself.”
A spokesperson for Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon Borough Council said: “We are aware of the issue affecting brown bin collections at Forest Glade, Lurgan, with parked vehicles preventing our bin lorry from safely accessing the development. We are engaging with the local nursery and residents to address the access issue.
“In the meantime, residents are encouraged to leave their brown bins out, as our crews will attempt to collect any missed bins on Saturday, September 12. We apologise for the inconvenience caused and thank residents for their patience and co-operation.”
