Fly-tipping in Bristol to be cleared up much quicker after major upgrade

Fly-tipping, graffiti and broken street lights in Bristol should be cleared or fixed much quicker thanks to a major upgrade to the FixMyStreet app and website. It means residents can now take a photo of the problem on their mobile phone, and location data can pinpoint exactly where it is so city council and Bristol Waste crews should have a better understanding of what needs sorting and precisely where.

The information will be sent automatically to the correct teams, leading to faster response times and cleaner streets, a recent meeting of the environment and sustainability committee was told. Users of the Bristol and the national FixMyStreet services can also be sent updates of the current status of the issue, scheduled work, reasons why there might be a delay and when it has been resolved.

And if the problem is not Bristol City Council’s responsibility, it will be either sent directly to the correct authority, such as National Highways, or the person reporting it will be redirected to the national site. Committee chair Cllr Martin Fodor (Green, Redland) told the meeting: “We have been piloting a new integration to the FixMyStreet system which is used by a lot of people through the website or the app, as well as people reporting things through our own website.

“The integration makes it much easier to report what’s happening and where and attach a photograph. It uses location data to integrate into the council’s own asset management system which means it’s easier to make sure repairs and reports are checked more promptly and efficiently.

“So that’s good news for those who want to report litter, fly-tipping and so on. That integration is really helpful and we’ve long wanted to make it easier for people to report.

“Securing greater communication between FixMyStreet and council services allows people to report street scene issues directly into our systems, meaning jobs are sent to the appropriate team quickly with a higher degree of accuracy, and with jobs not for the council making their way to the right organisation. These improvements to the council’s FixMyStreet integration and processes should result in residents seeing a difference made to the cleanliness of Bristol’s streets.”

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He said anyone wanting to report a problem could see what had already been reported in a particular location and subscribe to any reports they were interested in, which would help to prevent duplicate reports. Cllr Fodor said this meant the local authority could avoid significant costs associated with scheduling duplicate jobs and ensure staff and resources were allocated to jobs more efficiently.

He said the ability to send photos and share precise locations should help Bristol Waste crews understand the scale of the issue and make it much easier to find it. Bristol Waste operations director Dan Kelly said: “Our street cleansing teams cover more than 500 miles of Bristol’s streets each week, clearing litter, removing weeds and tackling fly-tips.

“By residents taking the time to report street issues via FixMyStreet, our dedicated teams can get straight to problem areas, tackling issues as quickly as possible. The FixMyStreet platform also means that reporting, adding photos and evidence to reports and getting updates is easier than ever before.

“This change will help keep Bristol clean, safe and sustainable.” Angela Dixon, managing director at SocietyWorks, which runs FixMyStreet, said: “We are really pleased to be supporting Bristol City Council as they take advantage of FixMyStreet Pro’s flexibility and integrate it with another of their systems to make managing street cleansing reports easier and more efficient.”

Some council services, including highways, parks, parking and the harbour, were already receiving reports direct from FixMyStreet.