Find out about:
Public recycling and litter bins
There are almost 450 solar smart bins, 230 public recycling bins, 2000 public litter bins and 500 cigarette butt bins around the City of Melbourne.
You’ll find recycling bins where people buy and consume drinks including food outlets in Bourke Street, Swanston Street and Southbank. Recycling bins are easily recognised - the new solar smart recycling bins are yellow and the standard recycling bins feature the distinctive yellow recycling symbol painted onto a blue background. To make it easy for you to bin all rubbish, each recycling bin is next to a litter bin.
The recycling bins can all take:
- glass bottles and jars
- plastic bottles
- aluminium and steel cans
- hard plastic containers, including take-away containers
- paper and cardboard
- take-away coffee cup lids.
Please do not put in the recycling bins:
- soft plastics, plastic bags, plastic wrap
- straws
- wooden cutlery, chopsticks
- polystyrene foam, foam cups, foam take-away containers
- take away coffee cup bases
- food scraps.
Solar smart bins
In high use areas of the central city we've introduced public solar smart recycling and litter bins. The new bins incorporate smart technology and will help us deliver a more sustainable long term service to city residents, workers, students and visitors. Look out for the twin solar bins placed in high use areas around the city – the yellow bin for recycling and the red bin for litter. Any solar bin that’s on its own is just for litter.