When specifying your metroSTOR PBM or PBL Bin Storage Units, the variety of options available can seem quite extensive. One area where it is well worth spending time to see what will work best is the door apertures. After the location of the stores, this is the area that will have the biggest impact on the effectiveness of your bin stores. The different options available are tried and tested, having been developed in conjunction with our clients over several years. We’ve put together a quick review of the options to help you choose the most suitable specification for your requirements.
No Aperture/Full Height Door:
You can choose to have no aperture in your bin store doors. This is worth considering in specific scenarios. Firstly, you may need to restrict the use of the bins to specific users. This could be bins on the street for shops and restaurants, or where a landlord only owns part of a residential complex and needs to ensure the bins are only used by their residents. Secondly, you may wish to allocate a section of a store to use for storing bulky waste items, to avoid creating a fly tipping magnet. A numeric keypad lock is ideal, to ensure access is restricted.
General Waste Aperture:
General waste apertures allow large items of waste such as full black sacks to be put in the bins, and are the right choice for bins allocated to collect general non-recyclable waste. They’re a failsafe option if you’re unable to ascertain what your requirements are, as any type of aperture can simply be installed at a later date if required.
Cardboard Only Aperture:
This aperture has a narrow slit-type opening that allows residents to ‘post’ cardboard and paper waste into the bins. The small opening helps prevent plastic bags from contaminating the recycling and forces residents to break down cardboard boxes so they take up less room in the container.
Plastic, Bottles & Cans Only Aperture:
This aperture has simple circular openings that allow non-bagged bottles, plastics and cans to be put into bins. As with all our aperture options, the openings are fitted with a rubber trim to prevent users contacting any sharp metal edges. Remember clear signage is critical here if you only need to collect glass bottles rather than plastic (or vice versa)!
Mixed Recycling Aperture:
These combination type apertures are ideal if you only collect one stream of dry mixed recyclables – paper, card, plastic and glass items can all be easily inserted through the opening, while the small size means that bags of waste cannot easily be put in the bin, removing a key source of recycling contamination. These apertures are sometimes referred to as ‘non-bagged recycling apertures’.
Signage Specified Recycling Aperture:
This slightly larger aperture size allows small bags of recyclables to be placed in the bins. It’s important to note that this aperture relies on the user correctly interpreting signage so they know which recyclables go in which containers – there is no physical barrier element to help force correct usage of the bins.
In Conclusion:
Remember, to achieve the best results, remember to specify the correct signage so it’s absolutely clear for your users what types of waste go in each container. metroSTOR’s flexible design philosophy means that our stores can adapt to your future requirements – so if your aperture requirements change in the future, it’s really simple to swap in a different type of aperture.
