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Ridge Meadows Recycling Society shares recycling tips ahead of holiday season

Hires additional flaggers to handle post-holiday traffic load this year
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The depot in Maple Ridge was packed after Christmas last year. (Leanne Koehn/Special to The News)

The Maple Ridge Recycling Depot is gearing up for the holiday season with the Ridge Meadows Recycling society sharing some advice to get through the mountain of cardboard and gift-wrap, painlessly this season.

According to Leanne Koehn of the society, the recycling depot is usually pretty busy on a regular day, with around 500 vehicles a day, but during the holidays, it goes up to 700 or even 900 vehicles a day.

“We start to get lineups at the depot starting around Dec. 27 and lasting a couple of weeks into January. We encourage all residents to visit the depot early, before 10 a.m. to avoid lineups,” she said.

This year, Ridge Meadows Recycling Society and Metro Vancouver have hired flaggers to help keep the lineups moving and direct traffic going into the Maple Ridge Recycling Depot and Metro Vancouver’s Waste Center.

“It’s all hands on deck in the public drop-off area during the busy time and we appreciate residents sorting their recycling at home before bringing it to the depot to save time. Like the curbside sort, at the depot, glass bottles & jars, soup & milk cartons, and metal packaging all go in separate bins and there are four different categories to sort plastic packaging into at the depot,” said Koehn.

ALSO READ: Flooding halts collection of glass and styrofoam recycling in Maple Ridge and Pitt Meadows

The recycling depot will be closed on Dec. 25 and Jan 1, while on Dec. 24 and Dec. 31, the depot will close early at 3 p.m.

“The amount of material brought in to the Depot and set out curbside during the holidays is huge! Seeing all the extra tonnage arrive at the depot around the holidays can be overwhelming and we appreciate the public’s patience during this busy time,” she said.

Koehn also said that the depot is encouraging residents to use reusable wrapping such as clothing, tea towels, drawings, etc. when possible and give gifts of experiences rather than stuff.

She also wants to remind everyone to remove all ribbons, bows, and non-paper decorations from your gift wrap before putting it in the yellow bag or bringing it to the depot, and said to “save them for next year!”

The depot won’t be accepting any shiny or non-paper gift wraps either.

“Any non-paper material mixed in is considered a contaminant – too much contamination and the whole bale could be rejected by the paper processors. Paper gift wrap only, please!” she said.

ALSO READ: Holiday cleanup: Here’s what you can – and can’t – recycle in B.C.


Have a story tip? Email: priyanka.ketkar@mapleridgenews.com
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The post-Christmas cardboard pile-up at the recycle depot. (Leanne Koehn/Special to The News)


Priyanka Ketkar

About the Author: Priyanka Ketkar

Priyanka Ketkar has been a journalist since 2011 with extensive experience in community-driven news writing, feature writing, and editing.
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