Waste depot campaigners take protest to City Hall
The Northside Says No To Rubbish group said they want city officials to take their share of the blame for creating a super-dump in their suburb.
And they called last night for a joint meeting with both the city and county managers in a bid to find a resolution to the controversy.
The call came after the campaigners escalated their ongoing protest against the operation of the Country Clean waste depot in Churchfield.
They blocked waste trucks on the depot’s access road for about an hour, the second such protest this week.
Some of the protesters then moved to City Hall to highlight their campaign.
Spokesman Maurice Sheehan said they wanted to bring their protest right to the doorsteps of the city’s decision makers.
“A blockade of bin trucks won’t achieve a solution,” he said. “We want to meet the city manager and the county manager in the same room at the same time to find a way to resolve this. It will involve the relocation of some waste operation business from this depot to the Bottlehill site. But only those senior officials can make that happen.”
County Clean said they were “very disappointed” that since agreements were hammered out with residents last month, pickets at the depot have continued “not allowing our employees, customers or suppliers access to our site”.
“We would have hoped that the residents’ committee would have worked with us while we implement the changes to a site that we have been working out of for over 10 years in which time we’ve had little or no problem,” a spokesman said.
Country Clean bought the city’s domestic waste collection service in 2009. Its Churchfield depot is now processing most of the domestic waste produced in the city following the closure of the landfill on the Kinsale Road, and Country Clean’s purchase of Healy’s Blue Bins.
But neighbouring residents have complained about odours, vermin, and noise from late-night recycling operations.
The EPA said it had identified a “poor level of compliance” at the site and was treating it as a “national priority site” pending completion of recommended works.
County Clean says it was working “very hard” to make sure the site was fully compliant with the EPA licence, and is fast-tracking those improvements.
The company confirmed last night that it is communicating with Cork County Council about the possible transfer of its black bag and food waste operations to the unused Bottlehill super-dump.
But the process is expected to take several months.
The Churchfield waste depot is expected to be raised at separate city and county council meetings next Monday.
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