Birmingham City Council has invested £1.4m in a pilot project that will see a fleet of mobile household recycling centres (MHRCs) rolled out across the city.

The four MHRCs will each feature three vehicles: a refuse collection vehicle for waste, a van for taking away items that can be reused by charities and a wagon with multiple compartments, enabling people to drop off waste for recycling by material type.

The MHRCs will be deployed in areas that rank highly in the fly-tipping league table, poorly on environmental cleanliness surveys, and low for take-up of the council’s paid-for bulky waste services.

‘Cleaner, greener, streets are an understandable expectation of the people of Birmingham,’ said Cllr Ian Ward, leader of Birmingham City Council.

‘We’re grateful for the work done by residents to keep their areas clean, and this is all about the council doing everything it can to play its part in delivering on one of the key priorities for people in this city.

‘That’s why we have assembled a bold programme of activity, supported by investment, to tackle some long-term and deep-rooted issues affecting our neighbourhoods.’

During the pilot project, which represents £1.4m of a £7.2m investment in street scene services, each of the council’s 69 wards will receive at least one visit from an MHRC in the next year. The scheme will then be assessed.

Cllr John O’Shea, cabinet member for street scene and parks, commented: ‘Since the start of the Coronavirus pandemic we have seen weekly fly-tipping case numbers increase significantly. In a typical week just before the global health crisis, we were receiving 500-600 reports of dumped rubbish. Fast forward to the present day and we now regularly get more than 800 reports a week.

‘But we know clean streets have been a key priority for people much longer than this. The Mobile HRCs will enable us to do something different and provide options for households in areas of greatest need – and we will also be able to reach parts of the city that are not close to our regular HRCs.

‘We are open to trialling new innovations as we are determined to deliver on the wishes of residents and businesses, and this will be just one of many things we will be introducing in the coming months to make our shared environment a better place for everyone.’

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