New litter picking station trialled at Fisherrow

My Beach Your Beach has teamed up with the Fisherrow Harbour and Seafront Association (FHSA) and East Lothian Council to trial a new communal litter picking station at Fisherrow Sands, one of seven Scottish beaches targeted by the campaign.

Previous litter picking stations trialed by My Beach Your Beach had worked well, however, easy access meant that equipment regularly went missing and they were eventually abandoned during the pandemic.

The new design, which has emerged from ongoing discussions with the community and council over the summer, is made up of a wheelie bin, that contains litter picking equipment and is locked with a four digit code. Anyone wishing to use the station must send an email to the FHSA group, who will manage the station, in order to receive the code by automatically generated response email. This way, the group can keep track of who is using their equipment and hopefully stop it from going missing, whilst still making it available to the wider community.

The stations is currently situated next to the Bathing Water signage at the community information point, at the entrance to the beach. If successful, the design may be rolled out more widely.

My Beach Your Beach is aimed at beaches that face challenges with bathing water quality and aims to support efforts to improve this, by encouraging locals and visitors to take better care of the sand and sea.

Georgina Massouraki, Campaigns Officer at Keep Scotland Beautiful, said: 'Empowering anyone visiting the beach to do a quick litter pick sends a positive message about ownership of our natural spaces, as well as having the practical benefit of encouraging and enabling more litter picking action to keep the sand and sea litter free.'

'The wheelie bins were provided by East Lothian Council, the litter picking equipment belongs to the FSHA, who have also taken on the ongoing management of the station, and My Beach Your Beach helped coordinate the design and installation, so this is truly a team effort.'

'It has been great to work with the local community and council to develop this and we're looking forward to seeing how it works! Hopefully it helps make a difference!'