Are You A Plastic Paddy…?

Plastic Paddy strikes again

ust as some people will happily throw half-filled milk cartons and encrusted pizza boxes into the recycling, it seems that those given the chance to dispose of their Christmas tree for free can also kick a gift horse in the mouth.

Situated down at the South Beach car park, the good people of Greystones and beyond are invited every year to drop off their discarded festive trees, with Wicklow County Council happy to do the rest.

What they’re not happy to do though is wade through discarded Christmas decorations – wreaths, hanging baskets and ribbons, etc. Which is why James Callery from Wicklow County Council has sent GG the following message…

Ever year Wicklow County Council provides a free tree shredding service for the people of Greystones at the Mill Road car park in front of the council offices.

This year the service suffered significant abuse with a variety of materials unsuitable for shredding left by members of the public, including wreaths, trees in pots, plastic decorations and other assorted items. Many black bags were left, some of which contain parts of Christmas trees, but no bags should be left on site.
It is unfair to expect someone operating a shredder to have to go through bags not knowing what is in them. Bags left on site added to the problem of dumping which occurred on this site.

Greystones is by far the busiest site in County Wicklow with, at its peak in early January, hundreds of trees arriving each day to be recycled. Wicklow County Council funds this service for the people of Greystones to prevent dumping of trees around the county and to ensure best practice in recycling the trees into mulch.
Because of the high demand for the service, the Mill Road car park is the only location big enough to deal with the number of trees left.

The scale of dumping of unsuitable materials is such that it threatens the provision of this annual service at this location in future years as it is unfair to local residents and car park user to have this happening in our community.

The site has been visited by Wicklow County Council enforcement officers searching for evidence and the cctv cameras on site will be used to identify people who were blatantly abusing the free service. Fines will be issued where appropriate.

More importantly Wicklow County Council, are appealing to users of the service next year to remember that only trees can be left. No plastics, soil, metals or wreaths should be left on the site as they can’t be shredded into mulch, and therefore can’t be handled by the service.

If you do bring a tree down chopped up in a bag, empty it out and bring the bag home.

Then the shredder operator knows what he is handling, and can shred all the trees received. Timetable here.