Street cleansing improvements being rolled out
Steps are being taken to improve standards of street cleanliness under St Albans City and District Council’s new contract with Veolia.
Stickers are being placed on all on-street litter bins inviting residents to report where bins are full or overflowing. All bins should have these stickers by the end of September.
A new street cleansing programme for the District has also just been introduced to help ensure that
nationally-set standards are delivered.
Streets are inspected each month by the Council to see if performance targets for the clearance of litter and detritus, including gravel, mud and leaves, are met. Using nationally recognised methodology each street is graded from A, the standard expected immediately after cleaning, to D for streets heavily affected by litter or detritus.
Under the Veolia contract acceptable levels of street cleanliness, of either Grade A or B, are expected for 95% of sites, for both litter and detritus.
Where an area falls below Grade B, the contractor must clean the street. Agreed response times vary from 6 hours to 28 days, depending on the nature and location of the street. These are set out in a street cleaning zoning map available online.
An update on street cleansing, including the latest performance figures, was presented to the Council’s Cabinet on Thursday 27 April.
Standards for litter clearance have improved over the last quarter with 95.6% of streets achieving the performance target of ‘acceptable’ standards in March. In relation to detritus clearance, 73.3% of streets achieved ‘acceptable’ standards.
Cabinet heard that the street cleansing programme is currently being revised to ensure that performance targets for both litter and detritus clearance are met.
Cllr Daniel Chichester-Miles, Portfolio Holder for Environment for St Albans City and District Council, said: “The Council is working with our contractors to improve street cleansing and the emptying of litter bins. At the start of the contract in June 2016 performance was affected by Veolia staff shortages. These have now been resolved and efforts are being made to establish a street cleansing process that meets performance targets across the board. Residents are welcome to report cases where they think that street cleansing standards are not being met.”
They can do this, by calling 01727 809019 or emailing wastemanagementservices@stalbans.gov.uk.
The update on street cleansing is included in the papers for the Cabinet meeting.
The meeting was webcast and can be watched on the Council’s website. (Please contact Democratic Services if you would like to see this webcast DemocraticServices@stalbans.gov.uk)
Councillor contact:
Cllr Daniel Chichester-Miles, Portfolio Holder for Environment for St Albans City and District Council
Tel: 01727 819281
Email: cllr.d.chichester-miles@stalbans.gov.uk
Contact for the media:
Amanda Wilkinson,
Media and Internal Communications Officer
St Albans City and District Council
Tel: 01727 819317
E-mail: amanda.wilkinson@stalbans.gov.uk
www.stalbans.gov.uk
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