One of the first probs i came across was that one side of the path is private, down to the land owner.
The path/track is a public highway, even though it isnt tarmaced, but mud, gravel and dog crap. Any fly tipping or litter is too expensive to remove and any prosecutions would only recover a small amount of cash.A lot less than the cost of removal and compensation/fines.
the Debri in the river isnt always down to the EA to remove but the river/stretch owner and again would cost the EA far more to remove.
It can be delt with by constant nagging in a constuctive way.
I constantley kept on at the council and EA.
They did get the private land owner to clean up his area of land. This included building site and home improvement debri and over 20 vehicals. Also thames water had acess to a pumpping station , this acess also entered the private land and a new security gate and fence was erected.
The council also removed some vehicals and Fly tipped Debri from the river bank and placed earth mounds across the entrance to the track.
An attempt was made to remove marginal debri, along with reeds and lillies???
That was then left on the bank, only for morons to chuck bikes, oil drums, crates etc back in.
Thames 21, local residents and Air Scouts supported by the coucils supply of a skip removed several tons of litter and debri.
This included beds, toys, doors, fridges and freezers, washing machienes, gates, oil drums, wheel barrows and so on.
The skip was removed the same day. This was a high profile exercise and a lot of locals watched us at work, even months later the area we cleared is still very clean apart from the odd bit of litter and milk crate.
Although the authorities have a duty to maintain an area, it is cheeper for them to encougrage voluntary groups.
Bexley council have a green flag award for their parks and open spaces and environment awards for conservation groups who maintain these areas, however the better off parts tend to be better maintained than the less well off areas within our local borough.
Thats why the Adopt-a-River program is so crucial to the north of bexley and the River Cray.