Liverpool’s iconic River Mersey is no longer the dirty Mersey or the biologically dead river it was in the 1970s or 1980s. Local environmentalists say its recovery from more than 200 years of industrial pollution may possibly be the ‘greatest river recovery in Europe’.

“There’s dolphins, harbour porpoises, there’s jelly fish in the docks. All of those things you expect to see on holiday are now here on people’s doorstep in Merseyside and the fact that now people really value them and people in Merseyside really value their wildlife,” says Mike Duddy,  senior project manager for the Mersey Rivers Trust, a charity which works to improve the river for people and wildlife.

“Over the last 30 years, there’s been this tremendous regeneration, this renewal of the River Mersey that started slowly but is now picking up pace,” he told the Liverpool Echo. “I still think we’re right at the beginning of something special.”