There will be a temporary closure of two of Belfast’s four recycling centres for “essential works.”
Belfast City Council has announced Household Waste Recycling Centres at Ormeau Park Road and Palmerston Road in East Belfast will be closed for works during February and March 2025.
The temporary closures will be phased so that residents have alternative facilities available to deposit their waste. The temporary closure to Park Road HWRC will be from February 16 to March 9 and for Palmerston it will be March 9 to March 31.
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A report for the council’s People and Communities Committee states: “A series of repair works have taken place at the Household Waste Recycling Centres over the years in order to maintain the integrity of the surface of the service bays. The most recent works involved the installation of steel plates in the concrete floor of the bay at Alexandra HWRC, which was carried out in October 2024.
“The HWRCs at Park Road and Palmerston Road remain outstanding and there is a window of opportunity to complete these essential works during February and March 2025.
“The works are required in order to address concrete degradation within the service bay containing the compactors and skips. This presents increasing safety concerns for both staff and service contractors when using equipment within the service bay.
“In the longer term the repair works will ensure service continuity, as failure to address the issue would lead to further degradation and the cessation of operations resulting in site closure. It is therefore essential that these repairs are completed as urgently as possible and unfortunately it is not possible to complete any work whilst continuing to provide a service from the site.
"Accordingly, the sites will have to be completely closed during the repair period. The temporary closures will be phased so that residents will have alternative facilities available to deposit their waste.”
It adds: “These timescales may be affected by weather conditions but the reopening dates will be kept under constant review and any changes (weather and works dependent) will be communicated via the council’s social media platforms.
“Signage will be placed at the entrance to each site. Due to the timescales involved and licensing requirements associated with waste facilities, it will not be possible to provide any ‘popup’ alternative sites and accordingly residents will be signposted to the other facilities across the city during this period.”
Alliance Councillor Hedley Abernethy said at the People and Communities Committee: “This is needed, and it is good it is being staggered, but no matter how much we publicise this, there will always be people who tell us they didn’t know. We will get the message out there, there will be appropriate signage at the centres, but there will always be people who say that.
“We talk a lot about pedestrian access, especially at Palmerston Road, but if the centres are going to be closed anyway, is this now a good time to think about the feasibility of pedestrian access to the recycling centre?”
A council official replied: “We are bringing about proposals trying to get quotations for works at Palmerston and Blackstaff, but Palmerston will be the priority. Once we have those proposals we will be seeking funding for them. We are in the hands of the architects and the structural engineers, to draw up the plans and get them costed.”
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