Wandsworth residents can bin bulky rubbish for free in the borough's "Mega Skip Day"

Wandsworth is hosting another of its "Mega Skip Days" in October for local residents to bin their bulky waste for free.

Between 9am and midday on Saturday October 16, residents can bring anything from sofas to mattresses and other large furniture items to one of five locations in the borough where mega skips will be placed.

After high demand at its previous "Mega Skip Day", the borough has doubled the number of skips and limited the number of items each household can dispose of to a maximum of six. One black bin bag is equal to one sofa, one mattress, so on and so forth.

Wandsworth has reminded residents that the skips are for household waste only, not business waste, and that they can bring anything with the following exceptions:

• No hazardous objects or dangerous materials: such as sharp objects, needles, dangerous chemicals, plasterboard, flammable liquids and asbestos.
• No bricks, paint, concrete, cement or fridges

Skips will be at the following locations:

• Acanthus Road, off Lavender Hill, >> Acanthus Road
• Balham Grove, >> Balham Grove
• Church Lane Car Park, >>Church Lane Car Park
• Malva Close, >> Malva Close
• Putney Park LanePutney Park Lane

There is normally a charge to dispose of bulky waste and these areas have had a high level of illegal fly-tipping in recent years.

Wandsworth Council will be collating figures of fly-tipping prior to Mega Skip Day and afterwards to judge its effectiveness.

Official Government figures show that while fly-tipping continues to pose a major challenge for councils and local communities across London, Wandsworth Borough has the second fewest fly-tips in inner London.

Cllr Steffi Sutters, council spokesperson for the environment said,

"This is a great opportunity for people to dispose of their unwanted household items for free.

"We spend more than £4 million a year on dealing with the blight of fly-tipping and picking litter off our streets so anything we can do to reduce this problem is a positive step forward."

Council staff will also be on hand to provide recycling bags as well as offering advice and the day itself is part of the MyWandsworth campaign to keep the borough looking its best. If the trial is a success, then the council will repeat it.

"Fly-tipping and littering is environmental vandalism that can ruin people's communities," added Cllr Sutters. "They not only create eyesores but are an unacceptable nuisance to public health that pollutes an area and attracts vermin."

Have a story in Clapham you want to share with us? Email [email protected], call 07742 524 934 or tweet @IssyMillett.

Find all the latest news from Clapham on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.