Moncrieff residents have experienced the growing turmoil of a sludge pit for the past 25 years and locals have had enough.
Moncrieff Landcare member Selwyn Jones and Greens candidate for Fenner Natasa Sojic volunteer to clean rubbish around the local area but say the sludge pit is the biggest issue for the never ending litter piles.
"The sludge pit was designed back when this area had no housing whatsoever," Mr Jones said.
"How it works is big vacuum trucks suck up all the sludge from barricades on streams but they can't take it to landfill because they won't accept wet sludge, so they bring it to a sludge pit to let it dry and then they scoop it up again and take it to the tip.
"The big problem is when it dries all the rubbish just gets blown all over the reserve into the streams and back into Lake Gungahlin again, so it's just a ridiculous setup because it's the biggest contributor to rubbish in our area."
A petition will be brought to the ACT Legislative Assembly in early February, Natasa Sojic is the principal petitioner and said her motivation came after Mr Jones showed her the rubbish in the pit.
"Selwyn took me to the sludge pit which I had driven past many times, but never looked in and as soon as I saw it I thought 'oh my God, this is where all the rubbish is coming from that we're picking up every month'," Ms Sojic said.
"We pick up rubbish every month and people walk past thanking us which is really wholesome but then you get shown this pit and you see where all the stockpiles of rubbish are coming from and as soon as wind blows it gets into the river, grass and reeds.
"It makes you question what you're even doing this for if it isn't been properly contained."
The pit not only poses as an environmental issue but also an increasing safety hazard which is another reason Ms Sojic is motivated to take this petition to the government.
"It's unanticipated for traffic to turn into the pit, the way the roundabout works the pit is a bit tucked away with the gates so people in cars behind the trucks can't predict if they're going to turn into it even if they have an indicator," she said.
"And also with them backing out it can create some traffic and safety issues."
