The Macreddin Mile

The Macreddin Pure Mile

Winner of the Natural Heritage Award

True community spirit…

‘The PURE Mile’ is an environmental initiative of the PURE (Protecting Uplands and Rural Environments) project which aims to foster a greater appreciation and awareness of our country roadscapes by rewarding and acknowledging local community efforts. This can be achieved through keeping a mile stretch of road (approx. 1.6 km), and the immediate environment litter/rubbish free, while simultaneously considering the preservation and careful maintenance of the flora and fauna, ditches, hedge-rows, and any other natural or man-made features of the area.

This is the story of just one mile of town land deep in Wicklow and more so the people and neighbours that reside here. Covering just a couple of years, we hope it, describes fully a great community journey, and a bit of craic, as well!

Our Pure Mile, the Clean Up

Before any Spring growth occurred it was decided to trim The Pure Mile and expose all the rubbish that had built up over many years. Monthly rubbish collections now take place on The Pure Mile and further beyond.

Our Pure Mile, the Landmarks

The Macreddin Pure Mile Committee identified many local landmarks and field names along our Pure Mile. Given that the natural stone in the area is granite and indeed the proximity of our Pure Mile to Aughrim, historically known as The Granite City, it was decided to highlight our local landmarks with cut granite and stone. All the Community contributed granite from their homesteads, some of these were cut gable stones or gate posts. We are sure that these would have been used previously by our ancestors in Macreddin.

Our Pure Mile, Our Community
Our Community BBQ

The Macreddin Pure Mile Committee host and annual Barbeque for the entire community in the Old Apple Orchard just below The Stable House on The Pure Mile. 87 of our neighbours, together with all the next generation of children attend, eat good convivial food and enjoy some real local music and a bit of craic…

Our Pure Mile, Our Future Generations

The Macreddin Pure Mile has set out to respect all that have contributed to the heritage that we have been given and understand that we are only land keepers for the next generation. Having ‘our inherited local field and land marks written in stone’ secures this transition. Given this inheritance we had no option but to include the next generation to copper-fasten this.

Our Pure Mile, Our Gift to the Future

Without doubt, our Pure Mile has made us all realise how precious our local history is to us. This Pure Mile is only here for us to maintain and pass over to the next generation in as pristine condition as we can manage. We also need to pass on the field names and land mark names that we have inherited. We have decided to do this with our local stone, so that these names will not be lost.

Of course new local field and land mark names will evolve with the next generations…as they always have done, however we now feel that our ancestor’s local names have been secured in stone. Stone it seems was so important to our ancestors along our Macreddin Pure Mile. It marked their boundaries, it provided a communal entrance gate to The Dip Tub, it built both our churches and much more.

More information on the Wild Foods, Wildlife, Field Names and Places of Interest along the Macreddin Mile…