Coles responds as 'sad' photo of major dumping issue emerges: 'What is wrong with people?'
Despite new technology being rolled out at some stores, Coles appears unable to prevent the ongoing issue of trolleys being dumped in the environment.
The issue of trolley 'litter' has long been something the major supermarkets have struggled to deal with. And Coles has been caught off guard this week with the waterway in a park filling with abandoned trolleys after being taken from a nearby store in a Westfield shopping centre.
Shopping trolleys being left dumped on nature strips, waterways and bushland have long been a problem in Canberra, and communities across the country. Photos shared on Monday from a major inner city park shows it's an issue that continues to persist.
Taken at John Knight Park in Belconnen, pictures from Monday show roughly 20 trolleys piling up in shallow water in the public area.
"This is why we can't have nice things. I'm not sure if it's about parenting, but given my kids pick up rubbish when we spot it on an outing, I'm sure there's some sense of being raised right that avoids this stuff later on," the local who shared the photos wrote.
It is an offence for anyone to remove a trolley from a shopping centre precinct, with an amendment to the territory's Litter Act 2004 allowing for an on the spot fine of $60 and a maximum fine of $1,100 for individuals who don't comply with obligations to return trolleys. However it is the retailers like Coles who are responsible for collecting them when they're dumped in the community.
Online, Canberrans expressed their frustration at the ongoing issue with some even calling for much harsher punishment for those who are caught doing it.
"How sad to see this. Disgraceful," one person wrote. "What is wrong with people?" wondered another local.
"Coming from Europe, I can only say this is as Australian as Vegemite. Nowhere else have I ever witnessed the absolute laziness of putting a trolley back in a bay five metres away, yet same time the absolute stubbornness to push it 2km down the road to ditch it in a storm drain or nature reserve," one commenter remarked.
Some wondered why the trolleys don't have wheel locks that prevent such a thing, like the company has rolled out in certain stores.
"Why don't they have wheel locks that stop turning after a certain distance? I found this out the hard way in Alice Springs many years ago," one person commented.
Coles responds to dumping scene
Coles declined to answer a number of specific questions from Yahoo News about how many trolleys the company loses. However Yahoo understands Coles was unaware of the carts being dumped in the water at the Belconnen park before it was contacted by Yahoo on Monday.
The store manages its own trolley collection and conducts daily street runs to retrieve them, but relies on the coin lock system to encourage people to return the trolleys.
"We spend a significant amount on maintaining [our trolley fleet] each year, some of which is the cost of having teams out on the road collecting trolleys that have been removed from our premises," a Coles spokesperson told Yahoo.
"Abandoned trolleys are a nuisance to local communities and we are continually working to make this better across all our stores, including regular collections of abandoned trolleys with vehicles on the road frequently.
"We are always reassessing our trolley management and take local feedback into account when deciding what methods to employ at any of our stores, including the use of coin locks and electronic wheel lock systems," the spokesperson said.
The supermarket giants says the trolleys have since been collected.
Trolley act likely costing Aussies at the checkout
The scene in Canberra this week is far from an isolated incident. With the issue often falling onto the shoulders of community groups and volunteers who spend countless hours fishing out trolleys from waterways around the country.
One of those is the Brisbane based Ocean Crusaders team who, on average, pull out about 300 trolleys a year from rivers and lakes, not just in Brisbane but throughout Sydney and Melbourne as well. Traditional metal trolleys can often be returned and reused, but often the plastic ones from Woolies — said to be made from 74 plastic milk bottles — can't be, founder Ian Thomson told Yahoo News Australia earlier this year.
Each trolley costs roughly $300 to replace, the Queenslander said, arguing that most stores "don't do much" to recover lost trolleys, or at least broken parts. "That's often being paid for with our groceries," he said, suggesting it's everyday Aussies who bear the brunt of the ultimate costs of the problem.
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