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Cardiff council insists plans to cut the number of recycling centres in the city to just two will result in a better service for residents.

The authority – which, until just over a year ago, had four such sites in the city – will determine in the next few weeks which sites should act as the city’s new “supertips”.

One will be the existing tip at Bessemer Close off Hadfield Road in Grangetown – and senior councillors will be asked to decide next month whether it will be joined by a new super site at Wedal Road, Cathays, or at Lamby Way in Rumney.

Both have existing recycling centres but the council will close one and build a significantly expanded facility at the other site.

'Didn't get it right'

But the cabinet member for environment also said lessons would be learned from the closure of the Waungron Road site in Fairwater last year.

Appearing before the authority’s environmental scrutiny committee on Tuesday, cabinet member Coun Bob Derbyshire said: “I have been very clear that we cannot have another issue like we had with Waungron Road.

“We didn’t get it right with Waungron Road, I have to be honest, not in terms of the closure but in terms of what we did subsequently.”

A referendum held in Fairwater earlier this year found almost all voters wanted the council to reopen the Waungron Road facility.

But although Coun Derbyshire said the decision to close the centre had not been wrong he admitted more information could have been provided to users about where they could go instead.

“Where we fell down was not getting enough proper information to residents about the alternatives for them,” he said.

New proposals 'a step forwards'

“Whatever site we decide to go for, at the other site people will be given enough information – that is an important thing we need to do.”

Coun Derbyshire also insisted the new regime would provide a more efficient service for Cardiff residents.

Political opponents have slammed the closure of the Waungron Road facility and the proposals to leave the city with just two recycling sites.

And voters in Fairwater and Llandaff voted overwhelmingly in local referenda held in the spring to reopen Waungron Road.

But Coun Derbyshire said: “We don’t see going down to two sites as a step backwards but as a step forwards.

“The new site will be a lot easier to get around – there will be more staff and more can be recycled.

SEE ALSO: Cardiff council announce plans to turn former Waungron recycling centre into a bus interchange

“It will be a much bigger site and more facilities within it for people to dispose of their things.”

The council’s cabinet is due to meet on July 16 and will be presented with a recommendation as to whether to earmark Wedal Road or Lamby Way as the site of the city’s second supertip.

Coun Derbyshire added: “There’s a balance to be made between Wedal Road, which a lot of people in the north of Cardiff like to use but which is next to a residential area, and Lamby Way, which doesn’t have any impact on residents but for which the people from the north have further to travel.

“We will be weighing up the options and seeing which is best.”

'Should be away from residents'

Liberal Democrat councillor for Cathays, Elizabeth Clark, said the Grangetown site at Bessemer Close would be less accessible to people from communities in the north and west of the city compared to Waungron Road. But she has also warned that a "super tip" at Wedal Road would result in increased traffic, noise and vibration for nearby residents.

Responding to concerns about the distance to the proposed sites, Coun Derbyshire said: “The point is these sites should be away from residents so they don’t have the problem of it being close to them.”

Trowbridge councillor Ralph Cook, the new chairman of the environmental scrutiny committee, said the distances people from the north of the city would have to travel was not one of the most pressing concerns.

He said: “If distance is the only issue then really it isn’t an issue. I don’t know why people get so worked up about these things. It’s ridiculous.”

The authority hopes to open the new supertip before the end of the current financial year.