VILLAGERS in North Queensferry are to lose a bottle bank after Fife Council said their new lorry is too big to get to it.

The container near the railway station has been removed meaning the only glass recycling facility is now in the Deep Sea World car park.

Community Council chairman Iain Mitchell said they were “really annoyed” about the situation.

“We have taken it up with Fife Council but I am not sure there is a great deal we can do about it,” he said.

“The one in Deep Sea World is only open when Deep Sea World is open because obviously you have to get into the car park and that is locked when Deep Sea World is closed.

“Considering there’s a scrap yard and a skip hire place and a furniture warehouse, lorries getting there can all get under the bridge at Jamestown and that can only mean that whatever they have bought is some kind of monstrous lorry.

"If they cannot get it up there, they cannot get it up there which is very annoying.

“They really have not been having any joined-up thinking when they ordered it.

“It is immensely annoying for the residents in North Queensferry because not everybody can get to the Deep Sea World car park during opening hours.

“I have spoken to several people who have always recycled their bottles and they have said they will just put it in the general blue bin that goes to landfill because they are not going to get to the bottle bank.

“It is a complete lack of any prior research and coming up with something which is having an inconvenience on a large number of people.”

Fife Council team manager of commercial and waste transfer operations for Resource Efficient Solutions, Scott Ramsay, explained: “Fife Council serve over 300 recycling points and 11 household waste recycling centres across Fife so it’s vital that we source the most efficient and economic vehicles possible.

“We recently upgraded our recycling collection fleet with two new glass collection vehicles that have lower carbon emissions and a reduced carbon footprint.

“Unfortunately, as these are larger vehicles, we’ve had to remove glass services at two of Fife’s recycling points, due to the height restrictions.

“To compensate for the removal of the glass bins at the railway station car park, we have increased the frequency of glass collection at the Deep Sea World recycling point.

“The town still has 7,680 litres of glass recycling provision per week – a figure that still exceeds the minimum capacity set out in Scotland’s Recycling Charter Code of Practice.”