Thousands will miss out on wheelie bins in Dudley

Dudley Council is currently assessing homes to see if they are suitable for the new bins. But it is estimated that up to 10 per cent of the 128,000 homes served by the council will remain using black bags.

Properties such as flats and homes with difficult access may continue with the old system.

The council plans to work with management companies of flats to see if an area for storing wheelie bins can be created in the future.

Bosses are due to start delivering the first of the wheelie bins to residents in some parts of the borough from Monday in the first phase of the £2.5million project.

Around 40,000 households in some areas of Quarry Bank, Netherton, Coseley, Kingswinford, Stourbridge and Halesowen will receive their bins in the coming weeks.

A second phase of deliveries is expected to take place later this year with the final phase being carried out by spring 2014.

Council spokesman Kate Arnold said today: "At the conclusion of the rollout we would anticipate no more than 10 per cent of properties will remain on sack services. A number of these properties are flats and we will be working with property management companies to develop suitable bin areas that will allow for the transition to a wheeled bin service at a later date.

"We are still in the process of assessing the suitability of properties which fall within other areas of the borough."

Residents will also receive two bags for paper, card, plastic bottles and cans following an expansion of the recycling services.

Specialist computer software has been used to determined the most efficient routes, taking into account the recycling trial that has been taking place in some areas of the borough.

Once all of the phases have been completed residents will only have one collection day for both recycling and household waste. Some residents currently have up to three.

Households will use their blue bag for paper and card, green bag for plastic bottles and cans and their existing black box for glass bottles and jars. It comes after Dudley Council received a government grant of £1.8m to extend the borough's recycling schemes.

The cash will also be used to enable the council to continue emptying bins every week.

The council was one of 85 authorities around the country which have had their application for the cash approved by the Department for Communities and Local Government.

At the moment households are given bin liners for household waste and a box for recycling paper, glass and tins.