May 21, 2021
Plans for a new Waste Transfer Station at Maidenwell were back on the agenda at this week’s South Burnett Regional Council committee meeting.
Last week Councillors rejected the idea of putting bigger skip bins at the facility along with automation equipment to hoist the bins on and off trucks.
However, further investigations had disclosed other options, and the projected cost is back to the original $350,000 figure.
Councillors were told staff had found one of Council’s waste truck fleet was under-utilised.
This truck had the capacity to cart bigger bins than those currently in use at Maidenwell, eliminating the need for specialised equipment or the purchase of a new vehicle.
Manager Craig Patch told the meeting another major project hold-up was negotiations with the State Government over clearing a new site on an adjoining landowner’s property.
He said that since Council’s last meeting, he had received a go-ahead from the State Government providing the new waste transfer site was at least a hectare in size.
This was larger than the Council had previously negotiated with the landowner.
But if they were willing to sell that amount of land, Mr Patch said the project would finally be able to proceed.
Councillors then discussed whether plans to have the new transfer station enclosed by a fence and only able to be accessed by a swipe card were still necessary.
Cr Gavin Jones said the biggest issue with Maidenwell was the number of non-residents who used it to dump household waste.
He thought a fenced, high-security waste transfer station under CCTV surveillance would eliminate that problem, just as it had at two similar facilities in Kumbia and Proston.
Discussion then turned to bin sizes, with Councillors eventually opting for enough bins to effectively double the transfer station’s current capacity.
Last week’s decision to abandon automation had shaved the project’s estimated cost from $350,000 to $230,000.
But the addition of extra land, CCTV and doubling current waste collection capacity pushed the project’s costs back to the original figure.
The decision to approve the new project will be ratified at Council’s next general meeting.
- Related article: Automated Waste Plan Rubbished
