The vice-president of Wollongong Mountain Bike Club, Craig Morris loves riding in the beauty of the escarpment. So when he saw a stack of litter, the Horsley local decided to take action.
The result: a massive clean-up of Mt Keira and Mt Kembla that collected 237 tyres and the Rise & Shine Silver Award at Council's 2024 Environment Volunteer Awards
“I’ve been riding bikes all my life, and in the last 25 years or so, mountain biking has really kicked off and I’ve been riding the trails ever since,” Craig says.
“The mountain bike community is up in the escarpment all the time, and we see all the rubbish. It’s really sad that people think it’s okay to just dump their junk in the bush.
“All it takes is for someone to put it up on Facebook, suggest that we do a clean-up, someone puts their hand up to organise it and then we get 40 or 50 people up there to do a massive clean-up.”
More than 40 mountain biking enthusiasts pitched in at last August's event, clearing five tonnes of waste. The volunteers divided the workload, gathering waste in groups along Mt Keira Road, Clive Bissell Drive and Harry Graham Drive.
“There’s furniture, there’s lots of litter but we also found miles and miles of electrical cabling, people dump cars up there, boats… some of it seems to be commercial equipment with businesses or tradies dumping their stuff,” Craig says.
“Then you’ve got a lot of domestic stuff as well, washing machines. We pulled out an incredible amount of car tyres, truck tyres, loads of car parts – it’s horrible.
“The council was really good with the Rise & Shine project. They gave us bags and first-aid kits, gloves, block-out, and some pickers, which made it much easier.”
Established in 1986, Rise & Shine is Wollongong City’s longest-running environmental clean-up program. Now, Rise and Shine supports local volunteers to protect the environment.
Craig was surprised to receive his award from Rise & Shine.
“You don’t do it to expect awards,” Craig says.
“It’s humbling in many ways because I organised it, but there’s 40 or 50 people that do it. So I accept the award on behalf of the group and the mountain biking community.”
Craig suggests that locals coordinate with neighbours to better manage waste and junk.
“It’s pretty sad that for both of the clean-ups we’ve done, within a week, there’s more stuff dumped,” Craig says.
“You see people’s comments where they say the council charges too much for the tip, but that’s not an excuse to dump it in the bush.
“If you work with your neighbours, everyone gets two council pick-ups a year. Say you’ve got three houses involved, that’s a clean-up every two months.”
Craig and his group are excited for new mountain bike trails at Mt Kembla, set to open in the next few months.
“If you’re wanting to get into mountain biking, there’s always plenty of people willing to take you out on trails. It’s a great past-time, you get out in the bush, you're exercising plenty and the community is really friendly and helpful.”
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