Man with a van but no parking plan
A surprise donation of an electric van to The Free Store in central Wellington is set to make life easier for the free food charity – but there’s a catch.
Despite approaching Wellington City Council, nearby businesses and parking companies, including Wilson Parking, founder and director Benjamin Johnson is struggling to find a car park close to the store’s Willis St premises.
‘‘Within our block, I’ve talked to a lot of different commercial building managers but it seems most places are at capacity but that doesn’t mean there’s not somewhere we don’t know about.’’
The van, a Nissan eNV200, is the second to be donated by Hopper Street community enterprise hub, with Just Zilch, a Palmerston North-based free food charity, receiving one last year.
Johnson says the generous gift will allow the charity to further reduce food waste and feed more vulnerable people.
‘‘We currently collect from 65 inner-city eateries using our converted shopping trolleys but this means we can go beyond our current capacity for collection.’’
Already, a number of new food suppliers such as Wishbone at Wellington Airport and Icon Catering have expressed an interest in donating surplus food.
‘‘We’ve never used a van because we wanted to operate on a zero-waste kaupapa so we’ve been pushing the trolleys around but now we have a van that still allows us to maintain zero-waste while also expanding our scope.
‘‘It would be a shame if not having a car park was a barrier to us collecting more food.’’
The Free Store serves about 100 people each night, with customers coming from all walks of life. While the store already redistributes more than 370,000 items of quality food per year, Johnson says there’s plenty of room for growth.
‘‘We want to find new avenues to get more food out into the community, especially for people who have significant barriers in accessing our services.’’
Johnson’s car park ‘‘wish list’’ is a secure site within two blocks of the store that has somewhere to plug in the charging cable.
❚ If you can help, contact Benjamin Johnson on: 027 426 1790 or benjamin@thefreestore.org.nz.