THE bin collector was right. The old bus station had been “minging”.

But look at it now! The hearts beating under our cohort of high-vis vests swelled as one, proud of the transformation we’d achieved.

OK, maybe not quite that Mills & Boon, but hey, you should have seen what we scraped, swept and pulled from that mouldering acre of concrete, and the amount of debris the county council’s refuse team took off to the tip as a result.

Random greenery growing out of crevices, empty bottles and cans, iron bars and chunks of masonry, scraps of carpet, a new-looking rucksack and a little brown bottle that had held ... what?

We’d happened upon a clandestine gathering place, it transpired. “Young folk tuck themselves away there,” said a curious passer-by, pointing at the darkened corner next to the long redundant Abbey Press building.

Another man, this time with a 14-week-old puppy, delighted with the multitude of smells emanating from the growing pile of rubbish bags, asked outright. What’s going on?

Hexham Town Clean Up week was the answer, during which a willing taskforce of volunteers had turned out to, well, turn the town around.

Dozens set to, armed to the armpits with wire brushes, dustpans, scissors and buckets of water bubbling with detergent.

Moss and mould be gone! Old posters, down you come. Neglected shop front? Give it a wash.

And sweeping – everyone did plenty of sweeping. The series of pictures I took of deputy mayor Bob Hull could be run together like one of those old picture books you flicked through to make the character move.

A study in determination, I would call it.

Bob and the rest of his particular team – mayor Tom Gillanders, a lady called Edwina and clerk to Hexham Town Council Jane Kevan – were definitely making a difference.

You could have eaten your dinner off the pavements of Priestpopple. They had an unnatural aura about them, they were so clean.

The atmosphere was a jolly one, too. When I suddenly registered the fact Edwina was Tom’s wife, Tom laughed: “People say ‘are you together’ and I say ‘yes, for the time being’.”

He wasn’t alone among the volunteers when he said, “A lot of people have passed by and said ‘well done’ and how much they appreciated our efforts.”

Wendy Breach similarly reported that, besides people singing the teams’ praises, she heard one or two asking how they could register for ‘the next one’.

Tom said: “We’ve had about five teams out each day this week – 15 to 20 people were out on Monday alone – and at least one team has been out every day except yesterday.”

The ‘yesterday’ in question was the Wednesday of howling winds and gusts strong enough to lift you off your feet. Fresh leaves simply swirled in to replace the mounds just removed. No point.

However, over the other four days, around 100 people pitched up at the bowling club house in Cowgarth to collect their industrial strength gloves, protective glasses and final instructions.

I say ‘final’ because there had been a whole meeting’s worth of instructions the week before.

Not much one for the fever-pitch nature of most health and safety mantra today, I sat through it, watching my watch.

But as we were sifting out the shards of serrated metal and broken glass on the front line, the warning not to attempt to pick up any needles we might find was still ringing in my head.

It took me back to Nepal last year and the moment one of my friends cleared a pile of rubbish from a windowsill in a hostel dormitory we were staying in, only to suddenly feel the prick of a needle as it punctured his hand.

The oppressive sense of worry that descended as he forced the wound to ‘bleed out’ was caution enough for me. As was the request, back in Hexham, not to put glass into bin liners, but in the metal bins on the high street instead. And if there was a crack in a window pane we were planning to wash, don’t do it, just leave it. And don’t climb on to anything to, say, clean signposts, or work at the edge of a busy road.

While I won’t be volunteering to be my office’s health and safety officer any time soon, I have to admit, I saw the light. If you are the organiser, as Hexham Community Partnership was in this instance, of a community event beset with a myriad of minor perils, what a nightmare!

There is something oh so satisfying about doing a clean up like this though. It’s hard to stop, because every time you look up, you can see the next line of weeds ahead of you or the army of discarded cigarette butts fanning out from the bus stop beyond.

And as Camille Mills, mother of three and wife of Owen Mills, general manager of Hexham Abbey Heritage Trading Limited, so rightly pointed out, there’s the social aspect too.

“I just wanted to come along and help clean up,” she said. “But there should be more things like this – it brings people together.”

Right on cue, Nick Anderson, owner of the Coffee Cup cafe nearby, came over. ‘Would you all like a cup of tea?’ The tools went down in a flash ­– everyone was lathered. “I really appreciate your efforts,” he said.

A couple of minutes later, we were lifting brightly coloured mugs off his tray and chatting. He opened the cafe five years ago in October, he said, when the old bus station had been ‘the’ bus station.

“They need to do something with this place,” he said, “and put in that walkway through to Marks & Spencer they were always talking about. That was a very popular idea.”

The murmur of comments were all in agreement with him. “Where is Dysart at with its redevelopment plans?” asked one.

“The planning permission it was granted in 2015 expires next month,” said another.

“But you can understand why they didn’t want to go ahead with a plan that included retail development,” said a third. “There are plenty enough empty shops as it is. Why would you build more?”

Hexham Civic Society member Wendy Breach said: “What we need in the heart of Hexham is more affordable housing, but developers are fighting shy of meeting that requirement.”

Tea break over and it was back to work, picking up, quite literally, where we’d left off.

Wendy decided to dispense with the emblematic implement that is the long-handled, don’t have to bend down, litter-picker. “You can’t pick anything up with it,” she said.

“No, you do just have to get down and use your hands,” agreed Camille.