Spreading coronavirus on the Regent's Canal towpath

Published: Tuesday, 07 April 2020

RegentsCanalSundayWITH the closing of Victoria Park people have flocked to the Regent's Canal towpath instead keeping the many elderly boaters self isolating prisoners in their boats.

The photograph of the canal along Victoria Park moorings on Sunday, showing the crowds thronging the narrow towpath, has been wildly distributed by the Press with many criticising Canal & River Trust for allowing such behaviour by not closing the towpaths after councils have closed parks and paths throughout the whole country.

Park is vast compared to narrow towpath

It was Tower Hamlets that closed the park in late March as people were not keeping to the social distance rules, yet the park is vast compared to the narrow towpath, often less than two metres wide—that is the accepted distance people must keep apart, and of course totally impossible on that towpath.

All the Trust have done is ask walkers, joggers and cyclists to limit use of towpaths and not pass moored boats, with hundreds of posters posted along the waterway, but the photograph clearly shows this has had no effect whatsoever.

Stupid minority

One resident boater who is an NHS midwife at a London hospital who posted images of people crowding the narrow towpath told PA News Agency the towpath had been particularly busy because of the closure of parks and the sunny weather, but blamed a 'stupid minority' for flouting social distancing rules, adding:

“Victoria Park towpath, is less than two metres wide. We will see the direct repercussions of this in two weeks.  It is Incredibly upsetting how selfish humans can be.

“I’m at work and it’s insane and people are dying and you go and spend one day at home and you think, who the hell are all these people. If you want to exercise, use the roads, there’s no traffic on them at the moment.”

600 passed boat in an hour

She told that neighbours, one an NHS doctor, recorded 600 people passing their boat in the space of an hour.

Two Metropolitan Police motorcycle outriders did turn up after she reported what was happening, but as it was then 5pm on Sunday, the crowds had thinned out.

The Times joins in

Even The Times has joined in, publishing a photograph of a packed Manchester Canal towpath thronged with walkers, joggers and cyclists—passing one of the Trust's notices.

The pressure on the Trust to completely close the towpaths to visitors is growing at an alarming rate, as more and more people are taking to the narrow towpaths contravening  the social distancing rules.

Health Secretary, Matt Hancock, has warned outdoor exercise could be banned if people continued to flout rules.