RIVERS group meeting

On Friday 26th January we held our first Cork City Rivers Group meeting

at the Glen Resource Centre. There were 30 of us in attendance

After teas// coffees and Maria Young’s delicious flapjacks we did a quick round the circle of introductions, gaining an insight to the breadth of knowledge, experience and representation for River Care in the room

Elinor Rivers opened  the meeting with a reading on water by zen philosopher D.T. Suzuki

In this first meeting we mapped out the rivers that run into the Lee, focusing on  the urban waterways of Cork City. [We also had a couple of outlying water bodies)

Starting in the North West of the city and moving clockwise we were representing The Shournagh, The Martin, The Bride, The Glennamought, The Glen, (the Glashaboy and the Butlerstown were also noted) The Tramore, The Glasheen, the Curraheen The Maglin.  Also present were The Dripsey and Blackwater rivers.

We each represented the river on our doorstep

There were seven questions I wanted to ask :

What Lives in the river?

What does the river Carry?

What threatens the river?

How can you protect the river?

What would you wish for your river?

If you asked the river what would (the river) say?

I somehow missed asking the most personal question, so I will ask it here:

What does the river bring to you?

and I will remember to ask it again from all of the RIVERS group participants.

We added these thoughts to the map.

Along with updates and expressions of concern for each of our rivers, there was a discussion about how to create an effective infra stucture for action on river issues.

Jenny Ahern delivered a presentation Stories of change: Community-Based Conservation