A Hucknall History

Public Utility & Services

Recycling Household Waste

An age old search for anything usable from discarded waste still finds one given definition for scavenging. Collecting coal fired dust and ashes had offered brick makers a base ingredient. Even chimney sweeps could supply soot to enrich gardeners composting. Ornately polished bones for likes of cutlery handles did lose fashion, without altering very common street cart cries from Rag and Bone men. Their eager and long continuing collection of old clothing was initially encouraged by Benjamin Law in West Yorkshire. His inventive 1813 grinding of rags into an industrially re-spun yarn created a recycled wool classifying 'The Shoddy Process’.

Huthwaite World War Efforts also generally adopted innovative ways to reuse as much as possible. Pubs with beer next ran short of drinking glasses, but made do with jam jars. Worthless empty glass jars were often kept by anyone making home preservatives. Equipping military prioritised all raw manufacturing materials. Repurposing emphasised demand to supplement supply shortages,

Resuming mass production added more affordable conveniences. Milkmen swapped their jug filling churns to deliver standardised pint glass milk bottles. Regularly leaving those on early morning doorsteps replaced rinsed empty bottles left out for sterilised dairy reuse. TV pleas to save and post all foil tops for recycling is how Blue Peter viewers raised money to train guide dogs for the blind.

Returning any undamaged glass beer and pop bottles to off licenses had rewarded youngsters trips. Shopkeepers willingly handed back a few pence on each, no doubt likewise compensated by all individually delivered brands reclaiming filled crates. Recalling a preference for Newcastle Brown Ale recognised how most breweries also cheaply reused their own uniquely styled glass bottles.

Ben Woolley senior was the Huthwaite Scrap Iron & Metal Dealer, who won contracts sourcing recyclable war effort metals. Lorries addressed a Columbia Street scrap yard business before purchasing a prestigious The Beeches house displayed wealthy reward. Son Ben continued that family business from Ashfield House, Sutton Road, running some admirably presented truck restorations.

Tony Sneep was another well known legendary village character, although at opposite end the recycling spectrum. Last of several long previous Huthwaite Rag and Bone men, Sneepy slept in a field parked caravan when shown maintaining regular local street rounds on horse and cart. Portraying a cheerful personality aided by frequent pub stops, services did help clear homes of unwanted larger items before ended by claim to fame. The Daily Mirror humorously reported B-test Steptoe 1st January 1987, failed a roadside breathalyser after police found Tony fallen asleep in charge his trusty horse drawn cart.

Household Waste & Recycling Centre

Losing long familiar Rag'n'Bone man collections happened to be around time Nottinghamshire County Council planned a Huthwaite Landfill site. A Recycling Centre compound run by Veolia Environmental Services next encouraged tidy disposals, usually brought in cars to be sorted into categorised skips.

Walks or drives to the bottle bank were soon a routine part of life for more conscientious populations. Tidier 2003 enclosure helped contain later overflows between weekly collections. Some eventually noted oddity separating contents that just got mixed by emptying all into one truck.

Unpublicized recycling plant technology must have stretched beyond extracting paper labels and metal screw tops into separating various coloured pieces. Mixing increasing quantities can next merit homes having blue boxes for monthly roadside emptying.

Supermarket shoppers favouring cheapest bought milk in plastic containers had already dramatically reduced the number of glass bottles, plus milkmen deliveries years before. A similarly explosive swap towards aluminium cans and plastic bottled liquid refreshments never came close to eradicating full desire for all glass vessels. But the biggest brands decided to end collections and cleansed reuse of their relabelled products from around year 2007.

Some might have argued their busier sterilisation plant raised environmental concerns. Logistical and financial benefits make much sense. Specialised recycling giants resupplying purified cullet leaves manufacturers to concentrate enlarging production efficiency.

Household Recycling Wheelie Bins

Notts County Council purchased all current green lidded wheelie bins for additional household recycling by Ashfield District Council from 2016. Dismissing communal point to potentially reuse paper, cardboard, tins, cans, plus various plastic tubs and bottles etc, all significantly contributed towards meeting a then set target of recycling beyond 50% of all household rubbish.

Their Environment and Sustainability Committee 2015 report had furthermore covered costing of replacing existing waste bins with current smaller red lidded bins. That enabled original black bins to gain further use for introducing garden waste disposals.

Ashfield DC then made a controversial switch from open blue boxes to far larger 2017 blue lid wheelie bins. They believed using green bins also for glass bottles and jars would have made processor plant separation more difficult. They did win favour not just by improving glass recycling rates. Mechanically emptying larger bins every 8 weeks may have realised greatest saving. Leaving many charities to since profit collecting home bagged textiles, ADC set their own next recycling target at 65 per cent by 2030,