Daily waste collection noise disturbs Kirkkonummi residents

A temporary recycling point has been returned next to homes in Veikkola, Kirkkonummi, where its emptying causes loud noise every day, Yle reports. The municipality is now looking for an alternative location.

Sami Kirjonen lives in a terraced house about 20 metres from the recycling point on Puronsuuntie. He says his days have recently begun with the sound of a large waste truck lifting a metal container, emptying it and dropping it back onto the ground.

“This has been happening every day for two months. It really gets to me,” Kirjonen said.

The recycling point was moved to Puronsuuntie in July as a temporary measure. The permanent point on Kisapolku is being renovated and will also be converted into a parking area. The work is expected to continue until December.

Emptying operations have taken place before 7am in August, according to information provided by Suomen Pakkauskierrätys Rinki, which is responsible for the point. Regulations in the Helsinki metropolitan area and Kirkkonummi allow waste loading from 6am to 10pm on weekdays.

The point has previously stood on Puronsuuntie. In November 2024, it was moved less than a kilometre away to the Kisapolku parking area, closer to large grocery stores, after residents had campaigned for its relocation for years.

Kirkkonummi’s municipal committee for urban engineering noted in June 2023 that Rinki was looking for a new location. It said the former site at the beginning of Puronsuuntie was cramped, difficult to monitor, increased littering in a nearby stream and caused problems for neighbouring housing companies.

Kirjonen has contacted Rinki, Kirkkonummi municipality and the environmental health authorities in the Espoo region. Rinki regional manager Harri Patana said Puronsuuntie was chosen as the temporary location because it was familiar, and that there had been few alternatives.

Rinki is also searching for another location, but has not yet found one. Kirjonen says he has suggested several possible sites to the municipality.

Kirkkonummi environmental inspector Elina Röman said she was unaware that the recycling point had been temporarily returned to Puronsuuntie until residents contacted her. Municipal infrastructure services director Toni Keski-Lusa also said he was not aware of a separate official decision on the temporary placement.

Röman said the municipality is looking for an alternative location for the rest of the year. One option under consideration is the parking area of the former Veikkola library, although there are also homes nearby.

“In an urban area, someone always suffers,” Röman said. She stressed that the current arrangement is temporary and said the point will be removed from Puronsuuntie by the end of the year at the latest, with efforts under way to find a better location sooner.