On The Verge

This time of year in Perth means spring cleaning.  Perthites are breaking out of their long, dark winter dormancy and busily preparing their homes and gardens for the summer ahead.  Generally this involves fertilizing the lawns, pruning the gardens, cleaning and treating swimming pools and proactively spraying for insects.

The municipalities are also getting in on the act.  Every year, around this time, the city of Perth and surrounding municipalities (including our "city" of Sterling) arrange for what's called "Verge Collection".  Essentially, the city will pick up your unwanted trash for free once a year.  The municipal governments send out a flyer (which will eventually make it's way back to them by way of rubbish collection) which states the date range of the garbage collection.  People will plan accordingly and place any unwanted junk on their curb (or verge) shortly before the collection is scheduled to begin.  Usually there is a 1-2 week window for the collection to occur.  So, in some cases there could be piles of trash lining an entire community for two weeks.

Here is a pile of unwanted stuff in front of our neighbors home.  This is a common site during the verge collection and can have an enormous negative effect on the aesthetics of a community.

Perthians will save up their trash for an entire year for the verge collection.  When we moved into our current home in November 2012 we had just missed the verge collection.  So, by the time this year rolled around we had a great deal of junk to dispose of: most of it directly related to moving house.  It was a great relief to finally "bring out our dead" (a common expression here based on a scene from Monty Pythons Holy Grail).

In general it is a great service that's provided.  In previous years, whenever we've had a build-up of junk that we need to dispose of it usually meant that we had to take a trip to the city dump.  This included loading up our vehicle (often several times), driving to and through the dump (which is not a pleasant smelling experience) and hope that our car/van didn't get stuck at the foot of the mountain of garbage.

In addition to collecting trash once a year, Perth also takes the responsibility for weekly trash collection including recyclables.  In Canada, we had a bin for garbage and a bin for recyclables: cans, bottles, paper, plastic, etc.  However, here there is one bin that we fill and wheel out once a week.  The bin may contain trash, bottles, paper or anything else that isn't toxic or considered dangerous.  Apparently, at the waste management facilities, the recyclable material is separated and properly dealt with.  There is no reason for people to hold onto bottles or cans as there is no deposit.  The positive of this is that we don't have mountains of cans and bottles stacking up in our garage.  The negative part of this is that since there is no financial incentive to hold on or collect these, you often see them discarded in parks and on the streets.  The irony is, while trying to make it easier for people to dispose of waste and keep the city clean, instead it has created more public littering especially around bars, pubs and liquor stores.