Managing around 500,000 tonnes of Waste per year, Western Riverside Waste Authority (WRWA) is the statutory body, or local authority, responsible for the disposal of household, commercial and industrial waste delivered to it by the London Boroughs of Hammersmith and Fulham, Lambeth, Wandsworth and the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea.
The Challenge
In response to eGovernment initiatives relating to recycling, Western Riverside needed a system which would collate information on the type and amount of waste and recyclable rubbish that is discarded by the residents of the four London boroughs. The information needed to be centrally collected and maintained, communicated effectively and efficiently to the individual boroughs and consolidated and published on a website to be made available to the general public. Currently information is collected via a computerised weighbridge system and emailed to the constituent councils on a daily or weekly basis. Problems occur with inaccuracies and inconsistencies and communicating corrections.
Selected to receive funding from the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (ODPM) and designated a Pathfinder project, WRWA worked closely with Wandsworth Borough Council to draw up a specification for a solution and subsequently a tender was issued.
The Solution
Dorset Software's proposal to deliver a bespoke software solution was selected as offering the best value and most closely matching WRWA's requirements.
Working closely with the Riverside Authority and the four London Boroughs to co-ordinate and combine their requirements, Dorset Software developed a Waste Management Suite, which comprises 3 main parts: The Waste Management System, which includes detailed analysis of recycling, 3rd party and weighbridge collection data; the Abandoned Vehicle database, which stores data and allows reporting and tracking on vehicles abandoned in the boroughs; and a public website to provides access to waste and recycling information for the general public.
The Benefits
The solution allows WRWA and the four London Boroughs to combine all aspects of waste management into one central secure system offering more comprehensive reporting and decreasing maintenance costs. Intuitive and easy to use, the Waste Management suite facilitates the completion of defra returns and ensures the transparency of target versus actual performance. The solution from Dorset Software is helping to satisfy egov regulations and enabling WRWA to offer a better public facing service at a reduced cost.
Technology Snapshot
The solution was built using Microsoft .NET technologies and is powered by a Microsoft SQL Server database. Historical data was migrated using a CSV file import. Standard letters are also available in word template format. Load data in XML format is imported by an automated scheduled import.
