Uselessness of coir
Like T Lang (What's the point of coir rolls?) I have seen this temporary Elastoplast fix being applied all over the network and sometimes no more than a year later the same bank has collapsed into the canal leaving these rotting tank-trap-like posts poking out just above the surface, making it impossible to get anywhere near the bank to moor, and little more than a muddy water logged mess that very little wildlife would choose as a home either.
Come back in 18 months
As I passed the CaRT team, laying this ineffective matting close to Yelvertoft, I slowed to tickover (I didn't want to wash it away before they'd laid it!) and suggested that the team put a note in their diaries to remind them to come back within 18 months to re-lay this entire section, as that was how long I expect it to last on this popular stretch of canal. The guy in the water turned to us and told us that he entirely agreed, and that the whole length needed new steel piling, but he was being told that that more permanent solution was too expensive.
So, as we all suspected, this latest 'solution' was nothing to do with wildlife, but more a short sighted and short term solution for those sat behind their desks, where this year's bonus targeted budgets and overhead reductions are more critical to their personal advancement up the corporate ladder, than the longer term view of sustaining this almost unique jewel in the UK crown.
Ticks the boxes
As with many large organisations these days, many of these career focussed employees have a tunnel vision approach to only doing that which ticks the boxes in their annual targets, in order that they can move onwards and upwards asap, leaving whatever mess they might leave behind them for the next poor sap to contend with.
I don't see it getting any better any time soon either. Do you?