Islanders keen to clear the decks of paper and cards

By 11am the site had seen 366 vehicles through the gates but it was forced to shut shortly after noon after winds exceeded safe working limits.

Among those who made it there before the site shut were the founders of the Priaulx Premature Baby Foundation, Jo and Andy Priaulx, who had brought along a small van load of cardboard packaging and seven clear bags of paper recycling.

‘It’s actually our 26th wedding anniversary today, and what better way to celebrate than with a trip to the dump,’ said Mrs Priaulx.

‘We come every year,’ added husband Andy. ‘I love it here.’

As the island will have blue bag collections this week, most visitors to the site were also bringing paper and cardboard.

Christopher Wilson and Bridgette Desperques were recycling 12 bags of cardboard and paper after hosting Christmas celebrations.

‘It’s basically all the stuff from Christmas, wrapping paper and cardboard packaging, it does mount up at this time of year, it more than double what we usually have,’ she said.

‘It’s not just from our house as we have my son’s in here too. He’s in a flat so its difficult to store.’

Waste and recycling operative Chris Bowring said the gap between Christmas and New Year was not actually the site’s busiest time.

‘We’re at our busiest just after New Year. Last year we had 1,007 vehicles visiting the site in just one day.’

This is the island’s first festive period since bring banks were removed in May, and Mr Bowring said they were seeing more visitors to the site.

‘We used to have just a wheely bin for bottles but we have had to replace that with a skip,’ he said.

‘We have also increased the number of cardboard bins on the site.’

Waste minimisation and sustainability manager Tina Norman-Ross said that on average 170 tonnes of recycling was collected from kerbside collections each week, but this would undoubtedly increase this week.

‘As we measure recycling over a four-week period it will be a little while before we see what kind of increase we have had,’ she said.

‘We will also see an increase in food waste.

‘It’s part of our love food, hate waste campaign to try to get everyone to think about how we buy food, as throwing it away is money going into the bin.’

The site is usually closed on Thursdays but was due to be opened today, if the high winds that saw the site close early had subsided.

Islanders were asked to check online or by ringing the site before visiting.

Longue Hougue is due to close at noon on New Year’s Eve and is closed on New Year’s Day with normal opening hours resuming on 2 January.

Mrs Norman-Ross also wanted to remind islanders to check their bin collection night as there were some changes over the festive period, at www.gov.gg/mybinnight