Cleaning up the Rochdale Canal towpath
15 March 2010
What a fantastic day dawned for a towpath tidy on Sunday the 7th of March in the Upper Calder Valley! Clear blue skies, beautiful sunshine and not a breath of wind. As I peeped through the curtains at 8.30 (very early for me on a Sunday!) my heart lifted when I saw sunshine.
On walking the towpath of the Rochdale Canal earlier in the week to put posters up for our SCOOP: Stop Contamination Of Our Paths event, I thought: there's not that much rubbish on the towpath. How wrong could I be!
After our trusty band of volunteers, local authority community wardens and a community police support officer had reached the end of a mile and a half stretch of the canal from Hebden Bridge to the outskirts of Mytholmroyd, we had filled a whopping 30 big black bin bags, as well as a big green glass recycling bag.
One of our group was really pleased at something we found: Kim the dog! She had great fun scampering up and down the towpath after a ball we unearthed. She also looked a bit askance at the poosticks that we placed near the very large number (and size in some cases!) of piles of dog poo! She's used to being hovered over with a bag in readiness for having her poo picked up. Unfortunately, not all other dog owners do the same, but attention has we hope, been drawn to the problem by the poosticks....
It was with a real sense of achievement that we had our butties and a brew at the Dusty Miller in Mytholmroyd. We had aching arms from wielding the litter pickers and carrying some very heavy bags for some distance, but felt wed done a really great job.
In total, for the Upper Calder Valley length of the Rochdale Canal, around 70 bags of rubbish was collected by the three teams taking part in this, the first event of this kind in our area, where the whole length was cleaned up. What a great effort by all the community minded people who freely gave their time and efforts to help make a difference to our much loved canal. A great big thank you to all in Todmorden, Hebden Bridge and Mytholmroyd and remember to keep a lookout for the next event!
By Louise Harrison, Project Co-ordinator, Upper Calder Valley Renaissance
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Victoria Macdonald said...
What a great job- just a shame it needs to be done in the first place. when we were moored at Todmorden somedog pooed down the side of our boat - it really irritated me.
More bins please.