Plastic Free Wilmslow

It’s official!

Plastic Free Wilmslow held their inaugural meeting on Tuesday 27 February 2018.  There was a great turn-out despite the awful weather.

A steering group has been formed to move the initiative forward with the goal of being accredited as a ‘Plastic Free Town’.

You can now be in touch with Plastic Free Wilmslow at  plasticfreewilmslow@gmail.com

Follow them on Twitter @PlasticFreeWilm

Look out for them at Wilmslow’s Artisan Market Saturday 21st April 2018.  Visit their stall and pick up lots of ideas.  Pledge your commitment to ditch single-use plastics

More about plastic free accreditaion here

Don’t think disposable – think re-useable!        

We have been looking at the feedback from the people who joined us on our Wilmslow Walks last year. More than 120 children and around 100 adults joined us on walks on Lindow Moss, learning more about the extraordinary historical, archeological and ecological landscape literally on our doorstep. We also enjoyed spending time walking in Meriton Park (including the Transition Wilmslow orchard) with members of the Time Out group. These walks were made possible by a CEC Participatory Budgetary Scheme to improve public health, by encouraging people to enjoy the outdoors. The children’s feedback has provided the basis for this word cloud, demonstrating how much they learned in a 90 minute walk around the Moss. Thank you to John Handley for leading the walks, to Denise, Jane, Jean, Pippa, Garry, Anthony and Helen for leading the children’s walks, and to Jean and Heather who are putting together maps for everyone to use.

We are offering another programme of walks for children this summer, and another of our famous Lindow Moss Dawn walks in September. We also have two more foraging walks planned: check our diary page and wilmslow.co.uk for details!

On 18 January 2018, 41 people came along to The Old Dancer in Wilmslow for food, drink and a showing of the inspirational film Tomorrow, featuring the Transition Network’s very own Rob Hopkins.

The film follows the filmmakers Cyril Dion and Mélanie Laurent, together with a team of four people, on a journey through ten different countries to figure out what issues may lead to global environmental disaster and what we can do to avoid it. During their journey, they meet those who are re-inventing agriculture, energy, economy, democracy and education and began to figure out what could be tomorrow’s world…

We filmed some of the reactions to the film: here. We also asked people to think about what they might do differently as a result of seeing the film, and they made these pledges:

Use small local traders more often

Buy less plastic packaging

If we can have a local currency (Wilmslow Pound) I will support it and use it wherever possible

Find out about our nearest junk Food Cafes

Buy more locally  Grow stuff in my garden (try to!)

Suggest to Heatons Sustainability Group that they organise a showing of this film

Think small scale local and don’t dismiss my own efforts

Create and work a vegetable patch in my own garden thinking of biodiversity and using eco friendly products

I will pass on the need for action now to my children to give them a better future and to ask them to do the same

Make a veggie garden at my school

Intercrop the veg in my garden       Cycle Plan for Wilmslow

Support development of a local currency  Be more community aware

Take an active role in a community project

If you would like to host a showing of Tomorrow to your community group or church, contact the Transition Network or search the Tomorrow website.

Thank you to everyone at The Old Dancer for looking after us and the fantastic food and drink.

Final call to join us for a chilli supper and film, upstairs at The Old Dancer, Grove Street, Wilmslow on Thursday 18 January 2018.

The film ‘Tomorrow’ will show how lots of positive things are happening in communities in many parts of the world – today. Working together, people can help provide solutions that will make our planet a better place to live in for our children and grandchildren – ‘Tomorrow’!

Bar available; chilli supper at 7pm with film from 8pm.  Please register your preference ‘regular’ or ‘veggie’ chilli.

Tickets £12. To book (by Sunday 14 January, please!) and for payment details see Eventbrite.

If you have watched Blue Planet 2, you will have seen the heart breaking scenes of mammals asphyxiating on plastic, and heard about the effect that micro plastics are having on our oceans. There seems to be some government action at last, with a World Ocean Summit in March, and a UK Government consultation on a plastic bottle deposit scheme. The effect of plastic bag reduction in the UK demonstrates that we can change our behaviour for the better,  with an 83% reduction in bag use since the 5p charge was introduced, so surely we can do the same with plastic bottles? Our friends at Transition New Mills are implementing a plastic strategy for New Mills, working with local retailers who offer to fill peoples’ own reusable water bottles for free….could we do the same here? Could you and your children cope without plastic straws? Are paper or biodegradable ones acceptable substitutes? We would like to raise awareness of the problem of plastic pollution, particularly from single use plastics here in Wilmslow….how should we do that? would you like to help? let us know if you have any ideas!

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Plastic Bottle awareness on a trip to Kenya!