Container deposit site proposed for West Melbourne

The City of Melbourne will consider a planning application that proposes to create a recycling centre within an industrial area of West Melbourne.

The proposed facility would be used as a transfer station at 8 Radcliffe St as part of Victoria’s container deposit scheme (CDS), which is set to be rolled out in November as the state government seeks to reform the waste and recycling sector.

The scheme will reward Victorians with a 10-cent refund for every eligible can, carton and bottle they return, with the service mooted for the West Melbourne site providing the public with “a convenient option to access the scheme by returning us eligible drink containers in exchange for cash or donation”.

If approved, the transfer station will serve as hub for collecting and temporarily storing recyclables before they are transported to recovery centres operated by the applicant.

The applicant, whose identity was redacted in the planning application, is an Indigenous-owned operator of CDS facilities across New South Wales, Queensland, and Northern Territory.

According to the plans, the 2550-square-metre site at Radcliffe St is understood to have been previously used for storage and warehousing associated with VicTrack.

The site at 8 Radcliffe St, West Melbourne, where a recycling centre is being proposed. Photo: Ajay Viswanath.

“The site is in the established industrial area in the City of Melbourne and is considered to be appropriate for the light industrial nature of the proposal,” the plans stated.

As there is an existing building, the plans said no significant buildings or works would be required.

Operation of the facility would be 7am to 7pm Monday to Saturday, and transfer of collected containers from the site would “typically occur no more than once per day outside of customer hours whenever possible,” the proposal stated.

Two staff would be on site, which could rise to four staff during busy periods.

The plans stated recyclables would be processed inside the existing facility via “efficient machine operation”, with noise impacts to the surrounding area being “negligible” and any potential dust or odour emission “practically non-existent”.

“The proposal will help meet the goals of key strategic policy documents at state and regional level: Recycling Victoria: A new economy and the Metropolitan Waste and Resource Recovery Implementation Plan 2016 by contributing to the CDS, helping to divert material from landfill, and contributing to the consolidation and recyclable material which can provide broader economic value.”

The CDS coordinator is VicReturn with Visy, Return-It, Cleanaway awarded the contracts as network operators for the central, east, and west regions respectively. •