Dump Points For Totally Independant Travellers

I was amazed on our recent Round Aus trip to find so many dump points. They are a bit less prolific in Victoria though. The West Aussies, NSW and QLD seem to have it right

Alloy, Tourists/Travellers will usually spend money wherever they stop. This helps the local businesses and economy. So I don't entirely agree with your comments.

Sheesh, Alloy, your a happy little vegemite ... NOT! I don't think that was where the original poster was coming from at all.
Where do you dispose of your waste?
OBJ

The point is that there is NO such thing as a totally independent traveller , someone is still paying for so called 'independent' travellers waste disposal and to complain that councils and ratepayers should provide infrastructure such as a 'dump point ' for free ?? Come on , pay your way ! Use the van park that has spent the $$$ for you benefit and is entitled to a return on that investment .

So Alloy c/t , you'd probably never use a public toilet then! Wouldn't want to use up ratepayers resources Eh!

Agree Alloy. Why should councils pay for a dump point. OR toilet blocks, park benches, parkland, water troughs, scenic walkways. The sooner we get rid of people who like some sort of an amenity the better off we all will be. Bloody taxpayers!! Fancy expecting something that many places would consider the norm!!

Now off you go Alloy and find that box of happy pills...

Or car parks, footpaths, parks and gardens and picnic areas, playgrounds and libraries. Better not use any of these if you are not a ratepayer in that town LOL.

And don't leave off "pay for parking".
Oh hang on those meters that seem to be sprouting up like weeds after the first rains get erected by the local shire.
Guess where the money for the road and bit of footpath on which they have been erected came from? The consolidated revenue of local ratepayers.
And you know what really rankles me is that they do not discriminate between locals and blow ins. We all get to put money in the slot.
Please don't start dragging in unrelated issues. It only goes to prove how weak your argument is.
You want a service but don't want to pay for it.
Well guess what sunshine. Someone does.

Yeah yeah yeah , U lot are "TOTALLY INDEPENDANT TRAVELLERS" but scream long and LOUD that others must provide services and infrastructure for U to be Independant …….OOOps Better get onto Tony Abbott to put a Dump point Conveniently in front of Parliament House for all these independant travellers …..

Many of the things councils do is funded by commonwealth or state grants under one umbrella or another and it all comes out of consolidated revenue, otherwise known as tax revenue, initially.

Some of what many councils do is designed to attract tourists to their region, more so for regional councils.

I don't doubt that there would be some grant program that covers the construction of a dump point in any town.

Constructing a dump point would be "using sprat to catch mackerel".

As a plumber I can say that it would cost virtually nothing to construct a dump point in nearly any town. It could be sited next to the council depot or beside the local sewer works as it is in some towns so the cost would be minimal.

Governments know only too well that one way to breath life into regional towns is to attract tourists to those regions and get them to spend a few dollars. It has worked exceptionally well, in some places, beyond expectation.

This creates employment as we all know but importantly it reduces the Govt. handouts in that area in all sorts of ways and injects a little confidence into the psyche in these places, powerful medicine. That is more important than govt handouts through social services.

Any council that ignores or shuns the tourist dollar is shooting itself in the foot.

One could ask ' so where is the nearest dump point


Outside my laundry door, all the old houses on sewer had a domestic sink outside in SA just lift the grate and dump and wash down with the tap. Also good for washing out paint brushes
bob

One should also mention that councils receive a contribution from the "RV Friendly Town" program so the cost to the "Local Ratepayer" is negligible.

There is an unfortunate view by some local govt areas that they should restrict the free, or low cost campers and make them stay in caravan parks. Now there are basically three different groups in the motorhome and caravan fraternity. Some will use van parks all the time, some will use van parks when it is convenient and the others are basically full time free campers and will not stop in a town unless there is a free camp available. This group is growing quickly.

A caravan park offers products to us, we choose whether that product meets our needs or not. One thing van parks could do is provide products that are more suited to the needs of the "Self Contained Travellers"

Public health matters and infrastructure, whether for locals or visitors, is a matter for government and it seems to me that ignorance of needs and/or petty fighting over funds might be the limiting factors. Has the RACV or a caravanning group done anything about making a submission to government for better access?

CMCA has proved to be the most pro-active in getting a much wider network of dump points. Those not eligible for full membership (ie those who don't have a motorhome) can contribute to CMCA by becoming an associate member.

Meanwhile most of us can campaign in our own town if it doesn't have a public dump point, and give them the details of the CMCA subsidy scheme. That would be the best network to get something happening. I have tried in my town and failed (not one single Councillor had any idea), but where previous caravan park management would not let non guests use the dump point for love or money, it can now be used for a $5 fee, but most do not like driving down into the caravan park when they are not staying.

Does you town have a public dump point?

Spot on MH
More and more towns are providing these facilities and they get my vote - plus custom.
The cost to install one of these dump points in a town that has a common effluent system and reticulated water is not great, especially if they avail themselves of the subsidy.
As for CPs charging full tote odds - $35(?) - to use one, that is just a blatant rip off. Even charging $10 is way above the marginal cost of provision, including the staff "cost" of half a minute to collect the fee.
As for the nearest one to home Alloy C/T, it is a private facility. About 2 metres from where I park the van next to the carport ;-)
Cheers
Andrew
PS One of the many advantages of using nappisan in the loo is that it is OK to dump in septic systems.

Wrong Wrong Wrong Motherhen , Dump points are nothing like a public toilet or footpath or parks and gardens in that they are for the exclusive use of a small section of the travelling public whom declare that being
'totally independent travellers' they do not "need" to pay their way for an infrastructure that is purely for their so called "independence"..!

So where do the funds for the dump points the CMCA scheme provides come from? Not from the local Council, although they do have to cover maintenance and cleaning costs as they do for public toilets, and the cleaning would be quicker and easier for the dump point.

Most of us pay rates somewhere, and are happy to "share" local facilities with visitors and travellers.

Oh dear Alloy c/t

I suppose it must be really quite annoying to see tourists, especially those who do not use the local CPs and might just be passing through, using facilities that were supplied by the local council (albeit possibly partly or wholly with funds provided by the Commonwealth or State government. Or maybe, heaven forbid, by a local business or voluntary organisation).

For example, the public toilets could have been made much smaller if only for local use. And parking places for caravans or even C/Ts, making it inconvenient for locals - no matter that they are spending money in the town. No need for such a large Information Centre built and staffed at considerable expense.

Take Broken Hill. Solid local economy based on mining. No need for tourism - just a pita really. But wait, they have a free dump point out by the race course. Mind you, to find it is a bit like geo-caching :-)

Next time I am passing through, I might find that there will be a large sign on the approaches stating "Self sufficient travelers not welcome here". Maybe eventually the locals issued with an ID card while outsiders will need to visit on a PAYG basis.

I am sure the local businesses would be right behind such an initiative.

Cheers
Andrew
(Tongue firmly in cheek)

Using that rather ludicrous logic we shouldn't cater for the needs of disabled users either. How about we cut out expensive medical procedures for rare diseases while we're at it?

Hey alloy ct, wheres your follow up, i love reading lunatic replies from people like yourself!

Yep agree. What a croc. "Totally Independant Travellers" my r's.

When you can generate all your own power needs, supply all your own water requirements, contain and process all your own grey and black water, recycle or dispose of your own general rubbish then and only then do you qualify as totally independent.
As long as the great 'someone' has to supply any of these you are dependent on that entity and it would appear that these services should be supplied free of charge to you.
And please don't try the old "but I pay my rates and you drive on my roads". Sorry that don't fly with me.
Try booking into a caravan park and pay for the right to a bit of ground to park on, the right to connect to their water supply, the right to plug into their power supply, the right to use the ablution block including laundry and the use of a dump point.
You may only need to do this on an irregular basis depending on just how "Independent" you are.

Poor choice of phrase maybe but if you want to apply the (extremely transparent) "ratepayer" logic then you'd better be prepared not to travel outside your local council area because somewhere along the line you'll be imposing yourself upon the "hospitality" of others. You might also be contributing directly and indirectly, and comparatively more than some ratepayers on a usage basis, but apparently that's irrelevant in the minds of some.

The 'don't use my roads, sit on my benches or dunnies, use my bins, take up my parking spot, etc' brigade have an interesting take on how societies function best.

Good luck if you come to Sydney. You'll pay to drive on the private toll road that gets you to the beach where the local council will charge you to park, 24 hours, 7 days a week!

It is user pays all the way...

Cheers, Baz - The Landy

I am a dependent traveller.

I can carry 85lt of drinking water and 170 lt of general use water and can store 85lt of grey water and a cassette of black water. I can pump water and filter it from creeks and billabongs to refill my tanks. I can use solar to generate more power than I can store in my three batteries.

But, I am dependent on other sources for clean water, somewhere to dump my grey/black water and general rubbish disposal.

I am also dependent on being able to get fuel so I am content to pay the price which may enable the roadhouse/servo to still be in business next time I pass. I buy my groceries and beer as I go and do not bring it all with me.

I do not steal toilet paper, hand soap, paper towel or water from community provided amenities.

It is a privilege and not a right to be able to travel. If the cost is too high, stay home and see it on Google street view.

We use our toilet on returning home. We are on a septic stem and we only use sodium percarbonate soaker powders.

Ahh but digging a deep hole is too much work for the 'Totally Independent Traveller ' … they want someone else to supply the hole at no cost to themselves ….

Ally, don't use my post to support your antagonistic comments.

I notice that Alloy has changed his tactics over the last year or 2.
Previously he would post a trolling message and not return (maybe just snigger watching the responses)
Nowadays he gets his titties in a tangle and cant help going ratatat on his keyboard.

Rob,
Yes, you are correct in saying that the travelling caravanners spend a lot of money while travelling, but where do they spend it.

I live in a small southcoast town,55km from a large country city and we have 3 fuel outlets,1 largish independent supermarket, a couple of smaller grocery outlets and a butcher. There are the usual clothes, newsagency and hardware places and 3 good caravan parks.
We don't have a public dump point yet, the current council is not in favour.

Because a group of us operate a woodturning club and outlet adjacent to the Visitor centre we get to talk to a fair number of tourists.

Apart from a number of questions about tourist places etc, a lot of the questions are about prices of food and fuel in our town and when we advise the prices they generally ask how far to the next big city (It's 55km), does it have a Coles/Woolies and questions about the fuel prices there. Then they jump into the van/mobile home and go there, they might buy enough fuel to get there but not bloody much else in our nice little town.

Disco, while what you say is true, it is not true for everybody.

I discovered a nice free camp near a New England town in NSW. I had to fuel up and resupply so we went into the town that provided the free camp and did just that. While I was there I made a big deal of telling the shop owners that I was staying out at their free camp and am spending money in there town ...and... at the same time thanked them very much for providing such a nice free camp. I got nothing but positives from those people. I stayed 4 days and spent over $300 in the town. And will do it again as often as I can. I can see the day though when a fee will be applied, maybe.

One of the local clubs and the council set the area up and a council worker comes around every week day to ensure there is sufficient loo paper and to ensure the facility is clean otherwise there is no supervision.

It is respected by everyone that uses it as far as I could see except for some locals, apparently from the next town, who left their campsite like a pig sty when they left.

I bought it to the attention of the council guy when he came out, as I knew they were local, and he said that they were probably from the next town. How do I know they were local?, once they set their camp up they ducked off for a half hour or so and came back with a boat in their box trailer. Must have been local therefore.

Not everybody is that tight that they will not give a benefit if they receive one. Many of us are very grateful for the privilege.

On the other hand up at Bolon in QLD I had heard they have a good free camp there and one day a chap called into the garage where the brother works and the brother commented "You have a pretty good free camp there in that town, how's it going?"

"You mean the water rats". Brother asked what he meant and the chap replied,

"Well they come into town and stay there for weeks for free and leave their rubbish behind when they go and boast that they did not spend so much as a dollar in the town".

These are the sorts of grubs which make it difficult for the rest and are the sort that get every bodies back up.

I guess the rule of thumb is;
'If you are going to use a facility in any given town, spend a dollar or ten their, even if it is just a full tank of fuel'. Every little helps.

Cheers, Bruce.

Maybe I should elaborate on what I said.
We belong to Bi-Tone West Coast Caravan Club and hold monthly Rallies.
At each rally the members are asked to give a tally of how much we spend in these small towns. We include every dollar we spend.
In a lot of cases we stay on council properties around the edge of ovals ie the local footy club etc. If the town has a caravan park we are forced to stay at those parks but the money still stays in the town via the council. At the end of the rally our co-ordinator tallies up our spends and you would be surprised how much we spend. we would probably as a club spend around $2000.00 for a 2 night stay, av 35 vans per rally.
As for public facilities,correct me if I'm wrong, there is only 1 public facility between Perth and Settlers Roadhouse at Myallup going the Forrest Highway. Hats off to the CMCA for all their efforts in helping to make motor home and caravan travel more comfortable.
I meant to mention; as a club we try to stay at small towns not the bigger ones and if you think caravanners don't spend what about FIFO's in the North West; they don't even go to the towns. They earn the big dollars and spend it in Perth or as luck would have it Busselton

I would add to that, never expect anything for nothing. If there is a good free camp then it's a bonus, not a right. The same applies for free dump points. Free camps and free dump points are loosely termed "tourist attractions". It's up to the locals to determine whether the upkeep/hassle is worth any benefits they might get back from independent travellers.