Dear Friends,
Last week the Waterways Watch Society had very low activities due to phase #2. We only managed to do 3 programmes: 1 Boat Waterway Clean-up Programme for 14 participants from Murex, 1 Bike Waterway Clean-up Programme for 16 participants from Salesforce and 1 Virtual Assembly Talk for 36 NUS students. Participants from Murex and Salesforce collected 77kg and 44kg of litter respectively. In addition, we had 1 programme cancelled due to the current spike of community cases.
On Wednesday, 4 members did boat patrol at Punggol. The water in Punggol Waterways was clean and not much litter collected (1 kg).
Due to the increasing community cases, we reduced the group size of our weekend patrols. On Saturday morning, there was only one group of 5 doing bike patrol, one group of 5, including skipper and secondary skipper, doing boat patrol and another 2 members doing pedal boat patrol plus two admin(see photos). The bike patrol group picked up litter at the regular hot spots: jetty area in front of the public toilet B after WWS pontoon, the embankment in front of the Singapore Flyer and area under Benjamin Sheares Bridge at Bay North (see photos). In total, the bike patrol group collected about 4kg of litter. The Marina Reservoir water was quite clean on Saturday morning. The boat patrol group moved towards MBS and Boat Quay. They picked up 4kg of litter, including mostly plastic bags, bottles and cans. Pedal boat patrol also didn’t pick up much litter, only about 2kg of plastic bags, bottles and food packaging. However, they spotted a snake at the corner near Kallang Wave Mall (see photo). A total of 10kg of litter was collected.
The Punggol team in the afternoon did a bike patrol with 3 members and 4 members did a boat patrol, additional 3 members were on a familiarizing bike tour at Punggol (see photos). The bike patrol group saw cleaners draining out water from the ponds and cleaning the litter. They told members that they were only activated to clean the ponds when there was too much litter and choke up the water flow (see photos). At the platform above the glass roof, one light was hanging upside down on the railing with screws missing (see photo). One shared bike (Anywheel) found chained at lamp post E16/46. The original lock mechanism is damaged (see photo). The float boom at Station 39 was partially submerged and not stopping the litter (see photo). The boat patrol group reported the water was relatively clean, but they picked up about 8kg of litter, mainly plastic wastes and cans (see photos). They also spotted the throw rope of the life buoy at the boardwalk was in the water. They informed the bike patrol group to help retrieve the rope (see photos). In total, both groups picked up 9kg of litter and 3 masks.
On Sunday morning, we had 3 patrol groups at Kallang: 4 members did bike patrol, 5 members did boat patrol and other 4 members did pedal boat patrol. In addition, 3 members came to do gardening and 3 admin. The Kallang River was very dirty. Lots of litter, mainly plastic bags and plastic bottles,were floating down the river. The boat patrol group spent about 1 hour at Kallang River and collected 25kg of litter and 8 masks. Then they surveyed the Singapore River which was quite clean. On their way back, they found lots of litter along Tanjong Rhu as well. In total, the boat patrol group picked up 40kg of litter and 3 masks. The usual hotspots for pedal boats were clean but lots of litter was picked outside the fishing zone. The pedal boat group picked up about 10kg of litter and 13 masks. On the other hand, the bike patrol group noticed less park users in the park, but lots of litter was found in front of the Public Toilet B and in front of the Singapore Flyer (see photos). The litter picked up by bike patrol is 5kg plus 9 masks. The total litter collected by Sunday groups at Kallang was 55kg of litter and 25 masks. In addition, the sign board at the Rochor River mouth was dented (see photo).
There was also a small group (5) that did their final boat training for drivers in two boats.
At Jurong Lakeside Garden, bike patrol was carried out with 3 members and boat patrol with 4 members in the afternoon (see photos). The boat patrol decided to stay within the area near Passion Wave due to the overcast and cloudy weather. The water was generally clean and boat patrol only picked up about 3kg of litter including one big metal can (see photos). A group of 4 fishermen was spotted fishing along the water edge near PUB pump house along Yuan Ching Road. The park area was also clean. The bike patrol group only picked up 1kg of plastic litter (see photos). In total, the bike and boat patrol group picked up 4kg of litter and no mask.
