The Barnet Council Street Scene service has put together a specialist team of leaf-clearers to ensure our borough is kept clean through autumn and winter.
Barnet Council has formed a specialist leaf-sweeping squad
This represents a considerable challenge in Barnet, a borough with over 30,000 street trees. The annual leaf fall from these trees is largely weather dependant and therefore unpredictable. As such a sustained effort is needed across many weeks to clear leaves from footways and highways during Autumn and Winter.
In June an additional £500k was allocated to Barnet’s Street Cleaning service for 2019/20. This is being used to implement the Street Cleaning Improvement options agreed at Environment Committee on Thursday 4 June, including improving our seasonal leaf clearing.
From Monday 28 October Barnet Council’s Street Scene service will be deploying teams specifically focussed on keeping streets and public spaces clear of leaves. This will focus initially on high footfall locations and transport hubs with the clearance of residential roads taking place after the bulk of the leaves have fallen. Teams will be clearing leaves through manual sweeping as well as removal through mechanical street sweepers and industrial vacuums. This work will continue until January 2020.
Barnet Council will also be making free leafing equipment available alongside litter picking equipment to community groups and volunteers via the Community Clean Up Fund. The fund has already received an excellent response after opening for the first time earlier this year. The Street Scene service, as in previous years, will also be working with Community Payback to tackle leaf fall in specific areas.
Residents and businesses can assist the council by not sweeping leaves from your frontages, driveways and gardens on to the footway but by collecting these for home composting. If you feel the leaves on your road require immediate attention please let us know. Please do, however, be reassured that all roads will be cleared during this period.
Councillor Dean Cohen, Chair of the Environment Committee, said: “I’d like to thank our Street Scene staff and all of our community volunteers for doing such an excellent job. Without all your hard work the borough would not be the great place that it is to work and live in.”