Litter action

Litter is an important ecological issue impacting Melbourne’s waterways and bays. Discover how you can take action, see what others in the community are doing, or find out where to learn more.

Each year, litter on our streets makes its way through stormwater drains into rivers and creeks, and then to our bays and oceans. Not only is it unsightly – it has devastating impacts on wildlife.

Melbourne Water helps protect waterways by cleaning up litter. In 2020-21, we spent $4.8 million collecting litter and debris from our waterways and drainage system. That’s around 1,695 cubic metres of rubbish – more than enough to fill half an Olympic-sized swimming pool!

Take action against litter

There are many ways to reduce litter, individually or as part of a community group.

Stop litter at the source

Prevent litter from becoming an issue before it reaches our waterways and bays:

• put litter in a bin
• participate in a clean-up day
• consider buying things with less packaging
• remember to reduce, reuse and recycle.

Start a litter reduction project

If your school or community group has a small litter reduction project, we can help provide funding through our Liveable Communities, Liveable Waterways Program.

If you’d like to discuss your project, email [email protected].

Join a community group

There are many local groups you can volunteer for or support as a member:

• Tangaroa Blue is a national not-for-profit dedicated to removing and preventing marine debris
• Port Phillip EcoCentre offers education programs and events on wildlife, waterways and climate
• BeachPatrol and Love Our Street volunteer groups pick up litter monthly from local areas
• Yarra Riverkeeper Association protects the Yarra, including through regular clean-up blitzes
• Werribee River Association works to protect the Werribee River and the waterways in its catchment.

Case studies: The Litter Action Project

Discover how communities and volunteers concerned about litter in their local waterways, and the impact on wildlife, embarked on a mission to tackle litter at its source. From construction site signage to murals and interactive sculptures, watch the following videos to see how they made a difference through Melbourne Water's Litter Action Project.

Bacchus Marsh

We collaborated with the Bacchus Marsh Platypus Alliance to encourage construction sites to prevent their litter entering the Werribee River - a home for platypus.

Litter Action: clean site for platypus - transcript

Diamond Creek

Diamond Creek has the highest rate of platypus litter entanglement across our area of operation. When volunteer litter audits discovered a nearby bin was constantly overflowing, we worked with Nillumbik Council to install a solar compacting bin.

Litter Action: Diamond Creek - transcript

Kororoit Creek

This ‘Litter Mural’, developed as a big art project for central Sunshine, draws attention to the fact that litter dropped on the street flows into Kororoit Creek. It was the result of a collaboration with Brimbank City Council, Sunshine Business Association and Friends of Kororoit Creek.

Litter Action: Sunshine litter mural - transcript

Our Home

We collaborated with Nature West and the Werribee River Association on an interactive sculpture to remind people that looking after our home also means looking after the environment.

Litter Action: Our Home sculpture - transcript

Learn more

Litter Trackers project

RMIT University’s Litter Trackers website contains maps and data from a ground-breaking project that followed 100 GPS-tracked bottles launched into Melbourne’s waterways. The 2019 project was a partnership with RMIT’s AQUEST Research Group.

Educators can also download our lesson plans:

• Litter Trackers project (Years 3-6)
• Litter Trackers project (Years 7-10)

LitterWatch Victoria

LitterWatch Victoria’s website provides a central location to store, interact with and extract litter data, collected from communities, organisations and government.