The Merseyside & West Cheshire Area organised a Public Ramble in the Amlwch area of Anglesey in June, where problems of footpath obstructions and vegetation overgrowth were encountered on a recce prior to the trip. Ingrid Donakey, Secretary of the Public Rambles wrote to the Yns Mons FP Secretary about these problems.
Ingrid says that “not only did they follow-up my FP obstruction problems but also their volunteer "Silver Slashers" cleared some of the overgrown paths to make them easier to walk in advance of our public ramble”.
One of the Public Ramble’s walkers then slipped on a tricky field stile on the actual walk. After the accident, Ingrid wrote to the local FP Secretary again to tell her what had happened and she followed through by inspecting the stile and instigating improvements to make it safer to use. The photographs illustrate the work they have done.
Andria Massey, Footpath Secretary Ynys Mon Ramblers Group, says, ‘that the Silver Slashers turned out for 50 sessions in 2009 with an average of 9 volunteers per session, Anglesey County Council paid travelling expenses which amounted to £2555 for the year so working on an average of 4.5 hours for the 451 volunteer sessions their work cost the Council £1.26 per hour, somewhat less than the minimum wage!’
Andria said, ‘All this goes to show what volunteers can achieve with real commitment from the local Council. We could not do this without all the help and support given by Anglesey County Council Public Rights of Way Team, we should never underestimate the time taken by this team to arrange and provide materials for the volunteers to carry out this work”.
To report a path succes just fillout the Path Success form and to let us know about a particular path success or practice that you would like to share you can e-mail the Walking Enviroment Team.
