The team reminisces
“When Burwood opened, the closest houses were in Queenspark Drive, they’ve crept closer and closer. We started in the area closest to the houses and built a mound to provide them with a buffer. Soon those houses are going to be close to one of Christchurch’s newest recreation areas,” Dave Harris says.
Tony Heuvell
Personal comfort was the biggest change for Tony Heuvell, an excavator operator.
“I remember my first winter in 1985. The compactor I operated was open and had poles in each corner. The rest of the guys wound plastic around the poles to keep me from freezing,” says Tony.
“These days the cabs are enclosed and have heating and cooling — you could live in them!”
Malcolm Green
Burwood’s site foreman, Malcolm Green, has been at the landfill since 1993 and has “done a bit of just about everything”, driving the compactor, loader, bulldozer and excavator.
Originally from the West Coast, he likes working out in the open.
“They could be long days,” he says. “Some were 12 hours and of course it was a six day operation. I know the team have looked forward to getting their weekends back.
“About 70 trucks a day passed through Burwood when it first opened,” Malcolm says.
“Over the years it has increased, especially when we started accepting refuse from outside of Christchurch, to more than 300 trucks. And they’ve changed; the trucks are bigger and faster these days.”
Ian Higgie
“I’m happy sitting on a machine and being out of town,” says Ian Higgie, who operated the compactor and worked at Burwood for some 19 years.
“From up here in the compactor I can check the shipping and see the spire of the Cathedral.”
Ian has seen business owners rush to the landfill in panic when they’ve discovered important documents, and on one occasion the weekend takings, have been thrown out by mistake.
“The most disappointing thing is we seem to be producing more rubbish,” Ian says.
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