Dorset Council has announced it will be changing the opening hours of all 10 of its Household Recycling Centres (HRCs, or “the tip”) from Friday 1 October.
From 1 October to 30 March, HRCs would usually be open from 10am to 4pm. From Friday 1 October, all HRCs will now open an hour earlier at 9am.
From next year, 1 April to 30 September, HRCs will still open at 9am but close at 5pm.
The revised times will bring Dorset Council’s HRCs in line with those in the BCP Council area and better reflect the demand for these services.
Average daily traffic data shows there is far more demand for HRCs between 9am and 10am (around 427 vehicles per hour) than there is between 5pm and 6pm (227 vehicles per hour). To reflect this behaviour and make things simpler for customers, our HRCs will now open at 9am all year round but keep the earlier 4pm closing time in the winter to address site safety as it gets darker earlier.
The move to open earlier will especially help during March, as we experienced higher numbers of visitors dropping off garden waste due to the early onset of warmer spring weather this year. Services struggled to cope as HRCs didn’t open until 10am but visitors had started arriving much earlier, and the facilities were only operating for six hours each day.
It is hoped the earlier opening times in winter will smooth demand throughout the day, matching visitors’ travelling patterns and reducing morning queue times.
As the move essentially involves moving one hour of daily operational time in summer to winter, the change of hours is cost neutral, with no amendments to existing management arrangements (provided by our contractors, W&S Recycling) or employee terms and conditions.
Cllr Jill Haynes, Dorset Council’s Portfolio Holder for Customer and Community Services, said: –
“It’s important that, wherever possible, we tailor our services to the needs and behaviours of the public that we serve. In this instance, we’ve looked at the data and it’s clear that people would much rather drop their waste at an HRC at 9am in the winter than between 5pm and 6pm in the summer, so we’re changing operating hours accordingly.
This change makes our messaging easier; all HRCs in Dorset are open from 9am daily all year round (except Christmas Day, Boxing Day and New Years Day). It will also address the historic issues we’ve had in March – and across the winter months generally – when some visitors want to drop their waste off first thing in the morning before carrying on with their day.
I’d like to thank our waste contracts team for their hard work researching and devising these changes, to our contractors W&S Recycling for the great job they do managing our 10 HRCs, and to everyone who uses them to ensure their waste is disposed of correctly.”
Today I went to the Sherborne re-cycling depot with some garden waste, an old radiator and toilet & cistern.
Amazed to be told it would cost me £1.50 to leave the toilet & cistern as it is deemed construction; though the radiator is not.
As a retired social worker, not a professional builder, who does his own DiY is this correct?
If so where can I find details of any price list please?
Hello Tony – this is correct. You can find details on chargeable waste at our HRCs at https://www.dorsetcouncil.gov.uk/bins-recycling-and-litter/recycling-centres-and-banks/recycling-centre-charges
Brook Rd Wimborne frequently has long queues, made worse by skip changing by one lorry making multiple lifts to the full and empty skip. If an empty wagon went in to lift the full skip and exit, followed immediately by a wagon dropping off an empty skip, this would substantially reduce the time taken and the queues that build up.
regarding the charge for heavy/ building materials, plasterboard, asbestos and gas bottles. This has been the case for several years and I think that this is very fair, as much of this cannot be recycled without charge to the council or in other words, us.
We have a very good facility in Dorset and I for one am very grateful