Great Western Coffee Shop

With more and more recycling (rightly) taking place, I've never been very impressed that there appears to be NO recycling take place from the rubbish removed from FGW trains.
Re-cycling doesn't occur during turn around train cleaning, WELL I'VE NEVER seen any! :(

Maybe re-cycling occurs at places like Laira, St Phillips Marsh, Old Oak and Long Rock, I think I've seen Newspaper recyle points at One depot, but what about Bottles & cans? ;)

I'm aware that various Stations and Offices in FGW land do have Paper re-cycling points however I was a witness to something I found UNBELIVABLE, totally stupid and unnecessary.  >:(
Whilst in a Station I witnessed the Station (Contract) cleaner take the FULL Plastic bag of paper from the re-cycle bin and casually dump said bag it to the Biffa Bin (which goes off to LANDFILL at GREAT cost to FGW).
To me that was 100% stupid, or at least MIGHTY stupid.

Is there a DUMB ****** of the year award?                                                                                                           
Whats the point of staff taking the time to Re-cycle when the result of there effort is ZERO% recyled.

IF FGW are in the least bit concerned about re-recycling issues I expect to see a Memo go to the contract cleaning firm.

However I won't hold my breath, I'd be Brown Bread.

In my experience, recycling contractors tend to be very, very quick to play the "it's contanimated, guv'nor - can't be doing with that" card. One bottle left with the top on, and the whole lot goes to landfill. One bit of plastic spotted amongst the paper, the whole lot goes to landfill.

Actually going through it by hand and sorting it out seems to be completely out of the question; any suggestion of this causing a loud sucking of the teeth and a sharp intake of breath followed by a "Oh I don't know about that, sir - see there's Health and Safety issues what come into play then, ain't there? No, we can't be a-doing of that, sir."

North Somerset and many other local authorities seem to manage OK sorting the mixed kerb side recycling collections. With the land fill taxes now, it must be cheaper for LA's to do this rather than send it all to landfill - so why not businesses like FGW?

Of course local authorities are obliged by government to recycle - even if perhaps it costs them money.   Presumably commercial companies like FGW look only at the bottom line in terms of costs and benefits.   They are I think now  waking up to the benefits of switching off DMUs rather than leaving them idling at stations.
A couple of years ago I e mailed RAIL suggsting they ran a review of TOCs and recycling - but presumably it was not regarded as a topic of interest to their readers.

It's look wwwwaaayyyy back ... but First did have someone looking at their environmental footprint a time ago:

http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?topic=657.msg22807#msg22807

Here's what other railways operators do ... this picture was taken on the platform and there were consistent things on trains

(http://www.wellho.net/pix/railrecycle.jpg)

Of course, I can't be sure that it doesn't all get dumped into a single landfill skip when noone's looking but I doubt it!

They've often left stuff in our green box despite them saying they allow such items. Milk bottles for example!

Hmm.  North Somerset's contractors (May Gurney) do seem to have a rather 'hit and miss' approach to recycling - just look at the letters page in the local paper!  :o ::)

Smokey at it again! All the serious issues in FGW at the moment such as overcrowding, poor performence and all smokey can go on about is recycling a couple of newspapers!  ::)

When staff have gone to the EFFORT of sorting Paper for re-cycling it's still Mighty dumb for a Cleaner to chuck it all in a Land Fill Waste bin.

Of course there are some WHO WILL NEVER RECYCLE, and the rest of us have to pay higher council tax bills due to there Selfish stance.

I never recycle and never have! is a waste of time, more effort is used recycling than making new.

So where do you expect to put your rubbish then?

You won't be able to put it in a hole in the ground for much longer because we are running out of them very soon.

You could burn it - but then people don't like living next to incinerators.

Arh but that not your problem it your council's problem - they have to come up with the answer - and pay for it - oh with your money!

I agree with Vacman that there's plenty of very important and immediate things ... but there are plenty of people around too and it doesn't need all of the people to spend all of the time on the immediate.  Let's encourage the sorting of rail issues, together withe sales and marketing of public transport for appropriate journeys, together with making the best (re)use of our resources all in parallel.

Well lets face it, this country use my money to pay for junkies, free loaders and everything else apart from me so yes I have got to the point where I dont really care!

With the amount of BIFFA bins FGW have emptied every week over the Network it's costing FGW ^Millions in landfill Tax.

Checked out one Web site which states it Cost's ^36 to empty a Biffa Bin that's holding Paper/Cardboard.

It Cost over ^135 to empty the same size Bin to go to Landfill.

At that rate It's costing FGW over ^3100 just to empty the Biffa bins at Penzance station.

Oh and that's a WEEK.

If recycled there be a Saving of ^2000 a week and that would pay for ANOTHER class 153 for a year.
and that's only the charge for a Smallish Station.

Then there's Long Rock Depot on top.

You need to appeciate that Rail is a 'seat of the pants' outfit. I'd be surprised if your email even found its way to somebody that might  say 'and why not?'

You are right though. EC seem to have a waste compactor arrangement in the South end car park at York...I assume it goes to landfill however.

All FGW Biffa waste is taken away and sorted by hand into landfill/recycled. Including on train bins.

That's fine - if EVERYTHING that goes into a standard runnish bin is paper or cardboard. But it isn't.

You's have one bin for paper/card, which costs ^36 to empty. Then one for Plastic, which presumably would be another ^36. Then there's glass - another ^36. And cans, another ^36. Plus you'd STILL have to have a bin for general, non recyclable waste which would presumably still cost ^135. Yes, you'd have to empty them less often, but the cost benefits of recycling on what is still a fairly small scale are nothing like what you pretend they are.

Oh, and any chance you could link to this website? Just stating "one website" doesn't make it a fact...