The first part of Croydon Council’s new waste contract starts today (5 March) with upgraded street cleaning.
Last year, Croydon Council partnered with three other London boroughs – Sutton, Kingston and Merton – to jointly procure a new contract on street cleaning, waste collection and recycling. The new contract is aimed at improving the service provided to Croydon residents, saving around £5m per year in costs to taxpayers and boosting recycling levels.
The first phase of Croydon’s deal with Veolia – street cleaning – starts today, with an extended green garden waste service beginning in April and the waste collection phase starting in the autumn.
The street cleaning part of the new contract includes:
• more street-sweeping vehicles, both large and small, as part of a £9.6m investment in new equipment;
• Veolia cleaning footpaths, pavements and Croydon housing estates;
• a programme to sweep up all autumn leaf fall from Croydon streets; and
• new uniforms for contractors.
Rather than staying on specific patches, street-cleaning staff will, instead, focus on roads that need clearing the most, with streets needing the most attention being cleaned and litter-picked up to six times a day.
The new contract will also see the reintroduction of street sweeping across the borough after 2pm each day, which had been dropped in 2010 under the previous contract.
Central to the new contract are tougher performance targets for Veolia, including clearing 100% of fly-tips within 24 hours of being reported. The current clear-up rate is 87% within 48 hours.
The number of large mechanical street-sweeping vehicles will increase from one to three, which can take up to two tonnes of waste at a time, meaning they can stay out collecting litter and debris for longer. Croydon’s roads will also get seven extra small mechanical street-sweeping machines, meaning contractors can use a total of 11.
Ahead of the new contract starting, the council introduced eight new street vacuums last year to clear streets in Croydon town centre, West Croydon and Broad Green. Another six vacuums have since begun cleaning streets around East Croydon and New Addington, with another 12 due to be introduced later this year.
Veolia staff and vehicles in Croydon will no longer be purple – instead, uniforms will be grey and green, and vehicles will be white. These will match the liveries used in the other boroughs covered by the South London Waste Partnership. Residents who are used to the orange street cleaning bags will now see green ones.
Councillor Stuart Collins, deputy leader – Clean Green Croydon
“This part of our new contract is important because our residents will receive a more consistently high standard of street cleaning across the borough, especially on roads that need it most.
“I can assure residents that we will be working closely with our contractor to make sure this week’s switch to the new contract is as smooth as possible and starts to deliver on their new targets.”
For more information on street cleaning or to report an issue, visit the website.
