With growing demand from the legions of grey nomads coming to town, Rockingham in Western Australia is looking into the possibility of providing public dump points.
The city’s caravan parks all offer dump points to guests, but there have been growing calls for similar facilities to be made available to travellers passing through or simply parking up elsewhere.
“The provision of public dump points in the City of Rockingham is currently being investigated as it has been identified that this type of facility may attract caravans and motorhomes into the city,” City of Rockingham Mayor, Barry Sammels, told the West Australian newspaper. “Public dump points are likely to need approval from the Water Corporation and will need to meet specific requirements related to the zoning and development approval of the property.”
Rockingham RV Centre owner Jim Groves told the newspaper he was frequently asked by people travelling through the city about the facilities.
“Every day people ring and ask where the dump sites are; people are driving straight past us and going to Mandurah,” he said. “When tourists are travelling they will get onto Google and find the dump sites. Wherever they are, that is where they are going to stay … the more we have got, the better off we are.”
Rockingham Kwinana Chamber of Commerce executive board member, Caroline Hume, has echoed these concerns and says improved facilities will bring more people to Rockingham.
It is the old saying,build it and they will come.
When we were on the road, dumpsites played a big part in us staying near the towns that had them. We would stay one or two nights in overnight stays and then in a caravan park for a night or two, fill up on fuel, do our shopping, eat out (usually fish and chips), find a laundrette for our washing, and see the sites the towns had to offer before moving on.
Dump points are good, but so is PARKING. Far to many times have i pulled into a town to shop and there is nowhere to park. Sometimes you are forced to park several klms away and push a trolley there and back.
And you just know how that works.
So come on town councils and pull those visionaries out of wherever they are and put a few facilities in place for us.
Slowly but surely these country areas are learning. Give us the facilities and we will stay a few days and spend money. Also a few sites are still 24 hours. Not enough time to look around the area and spend some cash.
We are in the town of York in W A and along the river is free camping with power for 24 hours, with a dump point, we found it too late,its along side a loverly green park, with seats and tables. If more towns had this they would get lots of people staying over.