Trolley rules should be reviewed says councillor

WITH abandoned trolleys to be found across the municipality, one councillor has said it might be time for the City of Ballarat to update its policy on the issue.

The City’s current trolley rules come under Community Local Law 2017, and Cr Ben Taylor said it’s time to look into the six-year-old rule.

“I think it’s worthwhile now. We’ve been through COVID and that’s caused a few concerns around how people utilise equipment especially around shopping centres,” he said.

“Now, as we see the shopping trolleys starting to break loose and get out there in the community, it’s worth reviewing what options are available.

“In the meantime, council can reinforce what needs to be done which is that the businesses that have the trolleys need to pick them up.

“Maybe they need to look at how those organisations can work better to do that because they do make the city pretty messy and it’s not good when they end up in waterways.”

Local Law 37, which covers trolleys, prohibits their abandonment on roads and vacant or municipal-owned land, while the company’s responsible for them must ensure collection.

Trolley abandoners and owners who fail to collect them can receive a maximum of 10 penalty units which Cr Taylor said equates to about a $10 fine.

He also said he couldn’t think of a time when the penalty has been enforced on owners since the law’s adoption.

“That’s the issue at the moment. We need to make sure when we have any penalty it needs to be enforced,” he said.

“I don’t recall when something like that’s been enforced on businesses for not picking them up.

“Maybe council doesn’t have a proper mechanism in place to do it either.”

Prior to the current local law, the municipality adopted a policy in 2012 mandating coin-operated trolleys throughout the city, which Cr Taylor said was ineffective.

“What we’ve seen is that coin-operating hasn’t really worked, even when we did have that law in place trolleys would still end up all over the city,” he said.

“I remember at the time I drove down Gillies Street and counted about 24 to 30 trolleys along there even when they were supposed to be coin-operated.”

Cr Taylor said a lot of the onus should be on stores to implement their own solutions preventing abandonment.

“I think there should be some responsibility back on the owners of the trolleys because then they might look into some other systems,” he said.

“I know some new shopping centres have different devices on the trolleys that will only work with proximity of the centre so they can’t go past certain boundaries.

“There’s different technology out there and the onus needs to be back on the owners.

“I remember years ago too the cost to make a trolley was about $800. I think now they’re only about $180 dollars or something, so maybe businesses think they’re a bit more disposable.

“Number one for council is to review it so the businesses are more responsible to go pick them up and if not, penalise accordingly.”