Trapped Trolleys Transformed

From the ABC:

For a number of years itinerant shopping trolleys have been appearing around the streets of Alice Springs. In river beds, parks, storm water drains and street curbs, the trolleys have become a fixture of the town's landscape.

One man has been leading the fight against rogue shopping trolleys. Mal Crowley appeared on ABC TV's New Inventors with his feral cat trap which was made out of shopping trolleys.

The accompanying video is funny, although it's a pity he has so many trolleys to use as raw material.

Crash Course In Trolley Collection

We've already talked about how abandoned shopping trolleys are dangerous - and would it seem to Coles is about to learn how expensive it is. This story is from October 15, 2008:

A BAYSWATER man is considering suing a giant supermarket chain after a car crash he believes was caused by a stray trolley left on a road at night.

The man says he has suffered continuing health problems since the accident.

His complaint comes in the wake of an outpouring of anger from Knox residents, upset over trolleys left dumped in their streets.

Craig Davies and a work colleague were travelling to the city for a business meeting at 7.30pm on June 25 when he suddenly saw a shopping trolley in the left lane of busy Burwood Highway.

Mr Davies said he swerved to avoid the trolley, smashing into the car in front of him, which in turn crashed into the car in front of it.

Lock and Load

It's amazing what fun you can find online.

Today I found this great piece on the poor an abused shopping trolley written in January by Louise Evans of The Australian:

THEY are unloved, abused, beaten and abandoned, yet we can't live without them.

They are the 21st-century equivalent of a donkey but even a beast of burden gets better treatment than the shopping trolley.
A television advertisement for NRMA Insurance was banned by the Advertising Standards Bureau because it showed boneheaded boys having shopping trolley races on a rooftop carpark and smashing their four-wheeled fun machine into a brick wall. Viewers complained the ad breached safety standards by showing "morons how to damage vehicles in car parks".

What about the damage to the shopping trolley? Just collateral.

A young mum with two nappy-wrapped screamers strapped in the back seat jumped out of her monster four-wheel-drive in fright after hearing a bang as she backed out of a small-car spot in a shopping centre car park. "Thank God it was only a trolley," she sighed as she pushed the offending tangle of metal in the direction of the escalator.

It's no wonder they all have wonky wheels, missing backs and mangled sides. The shopping trolley ranks lower on the food delivery chain than its equally abused and abandoned cousin the milk crate. At least you can sit on a milk crate.

Like all good piece of writing, there's some strong facts and figures to emerge:

• Woolworths says it loses 150,000 shopping trolleys a year to theft and damage
• It costs supermarkets $50,000,000 a year to keep shopping trolleys in adequate number in good repair

Wouldn't it be easier for shopping centre management and supermarkets to insists all trolleys have token operated locks?

Dangerous Trolleys Taken By Drunken Jerk

Theft of shopping centre trolleys may not seem like much of a crime - after all, it's just 'borrowing' a trolley to move groceries home, or to a cab rank or bus stop.

Well, as previously observed, loose trolleys are a magnet for other criminal acts such as property theft and vandalism, as well as dangerous stunts like Olly who has posted a two part 'comedy' video on You Tube.

Here's Olly's description:

This is a short guide to stealing a trolley, along with some suggestions on what to do with your trolley once aquired.
First, find a suitable supermarket thta would house a good deal of trolleys. Failing that, occasianally one may find a trolley down an alley or to the side of a poorly conditioned road.
Secondly, lift said trolley into a suitable pushing position, as many trolleys may be found on their side ot even completely upside down.
Thirdly, once your destination has been chosen, usually ones household or a nice big lake, push the trolley to this destination by placing your hands on the handlebar, and pushing in the desired direction.
Some extra tips:
Don just steal the trolley and then dump it...trolleys can be great fun when rode down a hill, or a steep road. Watch out for cars and other fun obstacles though!
Be creative...try new and inventive places to leave your trolley. You never know, you could even get artistically recognised.

While it might argued that Olly's stunt is a satirical look at what happen to unsecured trolleys, the video titled "Drunken Shopping trolley madness at the Monument Newcastle" certainly is not:

Theft On Wheels

In researching the hazards and problems surrounding shopping trolleys, I came across this interesting paper called Preventing retail crime by Susan Geason and Paul R Wilson and published by the Australian Institute of Criminology in 1992.

Here's what it had to say about supermarket trolleys and crime:

Loss of shopping trolleys
Shopping carts have a way of disappearing, especially where customers walk to the store instead of driving.

In Australia shopping trolleys cost about $200 each and most supermarkets have about $25,000 worth of them at any given time. About 5 per cent of all supermarket shopping trolleys disappear (personal communication, Australian Supermarket Institute 1991).

Shopping cart corrals: Supermarkets have dealt with trolley disappearances in a number of ways, for example many stores have installed barriers to keep carts at the customer loading zone in front of the store, though this does not stop all trolley theft.

Some markets allow customers to take carts to their cars and send employees out to scour the neighbourhood for carts people have taken home; others offer rewards for finding lost carts.

Cart corrals allow people to use carts however they want, but encourage them to return them on their own. This is how they work. A customer walks over to the cart storage area and puts a coin or a token in a device that has locked a cart to the cart in front of it. The first cart is then freed and the customer can use it in the store and the parking lot. The customer's coin is returned when he or she pushes the cart back into the cart corral.

Although that report is quite a few years ago now, I don't believe the facts will have changed over much. It's a pity that such an obvious solution, identified 16 years ago has not resulted in universal action.

Trolley Dump 5

A lovely, tree line shade street, children arriving home from school - a sweet suburban scene marred by two abandoned shopping trolleys that are more than half a kilometre away from the nearest supermarket.

Dangerous Train Of Steel

Last week I wrote a post on dangerous shopping trolleys and just today came across this story from Cairns:

KEITH Denton risks having his foot amputated, three years after his ankle was squashed by shopping trolleys outside a suburban shopping centre...

...In July 2005, The Cairns Post reported on Mr Denton's injuries after he said he was pinned up against a wall by a "dangerous train of steel" of between 30 and 40 trolleys. At the time Centro had fobbed off Mr Denton's claims about the number of trolleys and said footage showed only eight.

The story doesn't describe in detail how the specific incident occured, but if trolleys were locked in corrals when not in actual use, surely it makes sense that workplace injuries due to shopping trolleys would drop.

Hooray For Frankston

At least one council is taking the issue of shopping trolley dumpage seriously.

Frankston Council in Victora has made it part of their bylaws that every supermarket rolley has to be coin or token locked.

It's a fine of 10 penalty units for shops that don't supply the locking trolleys and a fine of 1 penalty unit for anyone who dumps a trolley.

Sorry, the document doesn't make it clear how much a penalty unit is worth.

You can see the documentation here.

Surely it can't be too hard to introduce this bylaw in all councils around the country?

Trolleys Not In The OK Corrall

Welcome to Surfers Paradise.

It's supposed to be the jewel in the crown of Gold Coast tourism but has recent copped criticism in the press over being a bit of a dump.

My husband and I like Surfers Paradise. We live nearby and like to go cycling during the weekends.

This time we remembered to bring a camera to record the number of dumped trolleys in the holiday precinct.

All the photographs in this post were taken Sunday, 22nd of June.

The above picture is not a nice introduction to the place is it?

But look! What do we have across the road from this trolley?

Two more trolleys dumped on disused building site.

There are two supermarkets within a two kilometre radius of this site and it doesn't take much to put the trolley back where you got it from. The only excuse I can find is ignorance and laziness.

And now, just a kilometre away from Chevron Island (where the above pictures were taken), on the eastern side of the Nerang River, we have this forlorn looking little model:



If that's not bad enough, this trolley was dumped in a park virtually across the road from the Coles Supermarket at the Chevron Renaissance shopping centre.

But I've saved the best (or should that be 'the worst') until last.

Where as these other shopping trolleys might eventually be wrangled back to their corral (by trailers towed by tractors or cars, causing pollution and CO2 emissions and that's another story), this trolley below (photo taken at the Broadwater in Southport) is in serious danger of turning into a hazard not only for people but also marine life.

Just take a look at how quickly the sand is beginning bury it.

Just remember, these pictures were taken from one suburb on one day.

One simple modification to the existing trolleys would fix this: All trolleys can be retrofitted to have a fix coin deposit locking systems.

One simple act of parliament of council bylaw could make this a reality.

If you agree, let me know by leaving a message in the comments below and then let your local councillor or state politician know that we want to do something about this problem

Welcome To My Trolley Hell

If there is one environmental issue that really gets my goat it's abandoned shopping trolleys.

It's the height laziness. For crying out loud, when you've unloaded your groceries, put the trolley back. It's not that hard and you might get some exercise along the way.

So why has this issue got me steamed?

1. I'm sick of having dents on my car doors from careless people leaving trolleys to roll down hill.
2. I'm sick of trolleys being dumped in my local creek by environmental vandals who've probably used the trolley to transport their ill-gotten haul as a result of their shop lifting and house breaking
3. I'm sick of trolleys being abandoned on the foot path hundred of metres away from the nearest shops by people who are too lazy to buy their own little portable trolley.
4. I'm sure doctors are sick of seeing injuries on kids who have decided to use the trolley as a billy kart or skateboard stunt accessory.

Solving this problem is so easy - lock the trolleys up!

It's can't be that difficult.

Aldis does it, Ikea does it and I've been told that some councils in Sydney and Melbourne have made it mandatory for ALL supermarkets to provide token lock shopping trolleys.

So, why should we do this?:

1. Reduce visual pollution of dumped trolleys
2. Reduce pollution caused by rusting trolleys in creeks and waterways
3. Reduce incidence of vehicle damage caused by runaway trolleys
4. Reduce injury to people who are accidentally hit by trolleys or who are injured by misusing trolleys
5. Reduce the number of vehicle movements required to pick up trolleys from around car parks and surrounding streets.

Please join me in my quest to make the streets a nicer, safer place and make the world a little more environmentally friendly.