Some of the city’s littlest litter-pickers have helped spruce up a park in Dalry to kick-start the latest phase of the City of Edinburgh Council’s Our Edinburgh campaign. The class of P2 pupils from Dalry Primary School donned brightly-coloured tabards and joined environmental wardens to learn about the effects of litter-dropping on the area yesterday.
Their efforts are part of the citywide initiative to encourage pride in local communities, addressing antisocial behaviour like littering, fly-tipping and dog fouling.
This stage of Our Edinburgh will run for four weeks in Gorgie and Dalry, selected as hotspots for fly-tipping-related issues, and will promote responsible waste disposal amongst residents and businesses via a range of channels, including door-to-door visits, bin stickers, media and social media promotion and cigarette ballot bins.
Transport and Environment Convener, Councillor Lesley Hinds, said: “Our Edinburgh is about promoting a sense of pride in our communities, so it’s great to be able to involve some of our youngest residents to learn about caring for their local environment.
“Since launching last summer, the campaign has proven successful in increasing awareness and encouraging responsible waste disposal, so I look forward to seeing its impact on Gorgie and Dalry.”
Elaine Honeyman, Head Teacher at Dalry Primary school, added: “We are delighted to be supporting this initiative, which will encourage our pupils to become responsible citizens and take pride in our local community.”
Our Edinburgh was first launched in the city centre over summer 2016, targeting litter-droppers with brightly-coloured bin branding and popular ‘ballot’ bins encouraging people to vote with their (cigarette) butts on a series of questions.
The second phase of the initiative focused on traders’ abuse of communal bins, fly-tipping and litter in the Leith Walk area. Investigation by environmental wardens found more than 50% of businesses not to have the correct trade waste contracts in place, while visits by the public to web pages for arranging special uplifts increased significantly.
In Gorgie and Dalry, the campaign will continue this creative approach, making use of street stencils, takeaway packaging stickers and targeted videos to engender pride in the local environment amongst residents.
Actions will support the Council’s new Waste and Cleansing Improvement Plan, and will run alongside a community engagement plan led by Waste Services and the South West Locality Team, which will see wardens visiting residents and local businesses, as well as working with local housing associations.
Find out more about the Council’s waste and street cleansing services online.
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