Paying with plastic!
Britain’s first car park where you get cash off if you bring in bottles
A PIOnEErInG green scheme that lets city centre drivers pay for pricey parking with plastic bottles has been launched.
In an imaginative bid to boost recycling, every empty bottle – of at least 500ml in capacity – is worth 20p off at the Merrion Centre car park in Leeds.
Hundreds have already been handed in and will be recycled into items such as toys and furniture.
Initially it is being run as a pilot scheme by parking operator CitiPark, which charges £3 for an hour up to £19 for 24 hours there.
Its attendant Chris Jones said: ‘This scheme is all about helping the environment, which is something our company takes quite seriously. Drivers just need to come to the customer services desk with their bottles and we’ll give them a discount on their ticket. They can bring as many as they like but they do have to be at least 500ml. People have really been buying into the idea and we’ve had lots of customers turning up with bottles to exchange. One man came in here with 30 bottles and got an hour for free.
‘Others just bring in one or two bottles. Hopefully this kind of thing could be introduced on a longer-term basis.’
To claim the discount, drivers give the bottles to an attendant in exchange for vouchers. Season ticket holders can’t take part.
Motorists at the 950- space car park yesterday were mostly enthusiastic about the offer, which initially runs just in October. Lucy Harris, 30, a recruitment consultant from Leeds, said: ‘Single-use plastic is a big concern so anything that encourages us to recycle bot- tles will make a really big difference. Especially if most people have plastic bottles lying in their car already. I really hope they expand the scheme nationwide. I think it’s an excellent idea.’
Visitors to Alton Towers, Thorpe Park, Legoland Windsor and Chessington World of Adventures can also exchange plastic bottles for discount vouchers and Tesco is trialling in- store recycling machines which will pay customers 10p for every bottle returned.
The Daily Mail has successfully highlighted the scourge of plastic litter and pollution with its Turn The Tide On Plastic campaign.