Business leaders have rolled up their sleeves to tidy-up Elgin High Street after locals demanded it was cleaned.
Complaints about weeds, litter and other mess are some of the most common issues raised by town centre shoppers.
A big clean-up is being planned by Elgin Town Board, which comprises council, business and community representatives, as part of a £20 million spending plan.
In advance of the operation though, the group of volunteers picked up their brooms, put on rubber gloves and filled up bags with cigarette ends, unwanted vegetation and even broken glass.
Business owners, senior officials and councillors all joined in the big tidy-up on Elgin High Street and down narrow closes.
The cleaning squad told the Press and Journal why it was important to have an attractive town centre for locals, visitors and businesses alike.
Where messy hotspots are on Elgin High Street
Teams assembled in the town centre before being directed to tidy-up the worst of the litter hotspots identified by Elgin Bid.
Armed with brooms, shovels and bags, the crews then swept the area from one end of the High Street to the other.
Special attention was paid to the closes where weeds, cigarette butts and muck had been allowed to gather unchecked.
Elgin Bid manager Angela Norrie said: “The High Street is where we have the biggest footfall, so sadly it’s also where we find the majority of the rubbish.
“It’s where our shopfronts are so it’s important to look after it.
“We all have a part to play in this. It’s our community and I think keeping our town tidy is something we all have to take ownership of.
“If we all spend a little bit of time on it then it can make a big difference. The gulls are still a problem and we want to try and do more to try and address that issue but we’re working within what we’re allowed to do at the moment.
“We’d like to get up and tackle some of the stuff higher up on the buildings. That kind of stuff is just impossible for us to do though, it’s really down to building owners to do that.”
Why Elgin town centre tidy-up is so important
Jenny Urquhart, who is chairwoman of Johnstons of Elgin, is leading Elgin Town Board’s mission to spend its £20 million of UK Government cash over 10 years.
One of the most popular requests from a public consultation was the High Street and town centre area to be cleaned and made more attractive.
Ms Urquhart said: “I think over time people have maybe expected someone else to take responsibility for tidying the High Street, but if it’s entirely down to us then all of us need to make the change ourselves.
“I really didn’t have an understanding of how dirty some of these closes could be. From just one of them we filled a bag with probably a couple of kilograms of waste.
“What has surprised me is seeing stuff like McDonald’s rubbish, which is obviously some distance away but it’s getting here somehow.
“We’re all volunteers ourselves on the board and we’re doing it because we want to do our bit for Elgin.
“Taking a bit more pride in our town centre starts with a bit of clean-up, but hopefully I can encourage more people to do their bit too.”
Helping to encourage Elgin High Street footfall
With Elgin High Street made up of dozens of small traders, business leaders joined the tidy-up in the hopes it can lead to a trading boost.
Mike Duncan, who lives in the Elgin area, is a development manager with the Federation of Small Businesses covering an area spanning Perth and Kinross, Angus, Aberdeenshire and Moray.
He said: “I joined the board because I wanted to make sure the voices of businesses was heard when the funding was being discussed.
“There are so many negative things you read on social media about the town centre that just aren’t true.
“People will say ‘there’s nothing there’, but we have an abundance of amazing local shops that really create a vibrant place for locals and vistors.
“Keeping it tidy is so important. Elgin Bid do a lot of work regularly, but it’s good to give them a few more bodies to help today.”
Leigh Scott is managing director of Northgate Accounting, which operates from above Ditsy Teacup on Thunderton Place.
He was joined on the tidy-up by 11-year-old daughter Abigail, who was given packs of shortbread as a gift by a member of the public to thank her for her hard work cleaning Elgin High Street.
Leigh, who is originally from Australia, said: “My wife is from Elgin so I hear from her parents about how it looked years ago and how it’s maybe not looking its best now.
“Anything we can do to get the place looking great to get more footfall into the town centre will help everyone.”
Councillors rolling up sleeves to clean High Street
Council leader Kathleen Robertson was among those rolling up their sleeves for an energetic tidy-up alongside senior officials from the local authority.
Despite being a Forres representative, she believes the cleanliness of Elgin’s High Street has knock-on benefits for the whole region.
She said: “Elgin is our county town and economic centre, so keeping it looking nice and attractive is very important.
“We want people to have that pride in where they live. Hopefully tidy-ups like this will encourage people to volunteer for regular sessions instead of just one-off days.
“I think Elgin suffers a bit at times from being too big, so it’s harder to organise volunteers. Forres is a bit smaller and Grant Park and the High Street flow together a bit more.”
Elgin North councillor Sandy Keith revealed he regularly picks up litter across the town to send a message to others to do the same.
He said: “I always think if I pick up two bits of rubbish a day and half the town did the same then that’s 20,000 bits of rubbish. If we all did that then everywhere would look a lot nicer.
“We all want to see Elgin tidier than it currently is. We’re out as just volunteers today but hopefully more professional cleaning will be done in the future.
“The town centre isn’t just a retail space for businesses, it’s recreational, a social hub and also residential because we have people living here.
“It’s so important to make it as attractive as it can be.”
Read more from Elgin
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- Is Elgin a long-established historic city or a large town? We try to clear up the confusion
- Elgin High Street pedestrianisation: The death of the town centre or the beginning of a shining new era?
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