Locals living in a Welsh town say they take their shopping trolleys home with them and leave them outside for their next trip.
Two housing housing estates surround an Aldi, Asda and Morrisons in the Gwent town of Cwmbran in Wales.
Locals say it is a ‘quirk’ of the area that instead of using shopping bags people simply push their trollies home from the shops.
They then leave them outside until they need them again.
Photos show the carts left in hedges, by roadsides and parked outside homes.
Trolley recovery service Trolleywise once reported collecting over 3,500 of them in Cwmbran in a month.
One local said: ‘I have lived in Cwmbran and it not unusual for people to push trolleys home if they don’t own a vehicle.
‘It definitely does affect all areas of Cwmbran. There are trolleys everywhere. They should have designated trolley lanes.’
Locals living in a Welsh town say they take their shopping trolleys home with them and leave them outside for their next trip
Two housing housing estates surround an Aldi , Asda and Morrisons in the Gwent town of Cwmbran in Wales, and trolleys from the shops are dotted around everywhere
A shopping cart parked outside someone’s home in Cwmbran
Shopping trolleys are seen in the street in the town
Another said: ‘They should charge £10 for the use of a trolley, refunded only when they are returned.
‘People who are taking the supermarket trolleys home should think about the reason why the prices in these supermarkets are going up.’
Trolleywise says it cannot access trollies parked on private property.
Asda says it has installed a perimeter line around the car park which means trollies can’t be taken off site.
A spokesperson said: ‘While we know that the majority of our customers take care of our trolleys.
‘If anyone spots one where it shouldn’t be, they can let us know by calling 0800 0933 350 or by downloading the Collex App, so the trolley can be collected as soon as possible.’
The Local Government Association has warned in the past that supermarkets need to do more to stop trolley thefts, as the ‘country is becoming blighted with abandoned carts’.
It added that many end up in rivers and canals, causing flooding and blockages.
Trolley recovery service Trolleywise once reported collecting over 3,500 trolleys in Cwmbran in a month
Locals say it is a ‘quirk’ of the area that instead of using shopping bags people simply push their trollies home from the shops
Some of the trolleys ‘parked’ by homes in the town
Photos show the carts left in hedges, by roadsides and parked outside homes
Possible measures include more bollards and security gates, and increased use of CCTV and wheel-locking devices which activate when trolleys are taken beyond supermarket perimeters.
The Trolleywise app – available for Apple and Android devices – lets users send photos of abandoned trolleys along with their GPS locations to a national collection service.
One of 47 local Trolleywise vans can then be sent to the location within 24 hours to recover the trolley and return it to nearby supermarkets – saving local authorities and retailers millions of pounds in clean-up costs each year.
According to Trolleywise, more than half of all shopping trolleys in service in the UK – around 1.5 million – go missing from supermarket car parks each year.
Many end up on wasteland, housing estates, parks, railways or water ways and are dangerous to wildlife and children.
