ReLondon, in their mission to make London a global leader in sustainability by revolutionising our relationship with stuff, ran a two-year pilot on how to make recycling easier for people who live in flats above shops on busy London high streets.
Standard waste collection methods are difficult to implement in these flats for a variety of reasons such as a single door that faces the main street - making it hard to store exterior bins - and no lifts in the building which makes it more difficult to carry out waste.
The pilot addressed those challenges to improve recycling rates in the city and meet the Mayor’s target of 50% of household waste to be recycled by 2030.
GC Insight conducted research with residents as part of an evaluation of the pilot.
There were several challenges with engaging this audience, including:
We adopted a pragmatic and creative approach, using engagement methods that seemed feasible in light of the complexity and constraints, and openly acknowledged the limitations of the methods.
Together with ReLondon, we devised a multi-method approach using an online form and qualitative interviews to explore changes in resident’s behaviour related to dry mixed recycling and food waste:
Conversely, the research identified where the pilot was less effective in changing resident behaviour, for whom and why.
ReLondon used the findings from our research alongside pre- and post-waste monitoring to understand the impact and effectiveness of the pilot.
The full report on the project can be found on ReLondon’s website here.
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