Coronavirus Gold Coast: Major changes planned for council dumps after staff abused and giant lines

Massive lines and members of the public abusing council staff has lead to major changes being made to Gold Coast tips, to be announced this morning.

STRICT new restrictions will be put on Gold Coast City Council dumps and recycling centres after staff at them were abused.

The city council will today announce the new restrictions, which will come into effect from Saturday.

The line-up outside one of the council’s tips in recent weeks.

They new measures include:

* Visitors to the Molendinar and Reedy Creek centres will be limited to commercial and small business customers between the hours of 7am-9am daily.

* Residential green waste will only be accepted at Coomera, Molendinar, Merrimac and Reedy Creek.

* To minimise congestion, vehicles will be limited to “odd and even” dates matching the first number of their vehicle registration number. Cars with personalised plats will be treated as odd numbers.

* No e-waste such as computers will be accepted until further notice.

Mayor Tom Tate this week. Picture: Adam Head

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Mayor Tom Tate said the measures were the result of major issues caused by the COVID-19 crisis, in particular excessive customers and aggression toward staff.

“Despite repeated requests by the Mayor, Premier and Prime Minister imploring residents to stay at home and only go out for essential services, our Waste Recycling Centres have been overwhelmed with customers,” he said.

“This is placing the health and safety of city staff and customers at elevated risk.

Council is making some changes.