SOAPBOX: It's time to push a trolley solution

FOR the first time in my life, I'm living in a trolley suburb.

Lost trolleys are everywhere, but especially near shopping centres. Picture: Geoff Potter

FOR the first time in my life, I'm living in a trolley suburb.

We now live just over a kilometre down the road from a major shopping centre with three supermarkets.

Along that stretch of road, there are usually about 10 trolleys abandoned in nature strips, front yards, parks and the road shoulder.

My perception on the world has changed in my time living there.

It's like when you think of buying a car, and suddenly see them all over the roads.

Now everywhere I go, I notice the trolleys lying about.

It took me a few weeks to actually catch someone in the act of walking home with their bags in a trolley.

She was an older woman, although not yet elderly - sprightly enough to push a trolley a few hundred metres home, but not so much that she could have just carried the bags.

Maybe she didn't have a car, or wasn't confident enough to drive.

But if the trolley-lined street she was walking down was any indication, I doubt she returned the trolley after unpacking her groceries.

While I can see the weekly shop is an issue for those people, until outlets crack down on trolley "borrowers" they'll continue to leave them strewn about.

We need a better solution for the trolley pushers, one that involves a carrot and stick combo.

The centre could offer courtesy buses for the surrounding area, while also engaging wheel or coin locks that force shoppers to kick the habit.