ROCKLAND — “I’ve been agitating for seven years for this to happen,” Capt. Jim Sharp said during the ribbon-cutting ceremony for Mechanic Street’s leg of the Harbor Trail.

The ceremony took place at the start of the Coastal Cleanup Day, at which volunteers split into three groups to pick up trash at Snow Marine Park, Sandy Beach, and near the Boardwalk.

Sharp is one of many residents who has envisioned a safe pedestrian route along Rockland’s waterfront. So intent on the vision was he, that he permitted a side-walk width easement at the edge of his property to allow for the gravel trail that now exists.

Residents have been envisioning the completion of the entire five-mile urban walkway, from the Breakwater to Mechanic Street, for the past 20 years, according to City Councilor and Harbor Trail Committee member Louise MacLellan-Ruf.

“What we needed to do was look at what we could get done,” MacLellan-Ruf said. “What happened was, people would get very excited over 20-something years about the whole vision....and then nothing got done. When I took over as chair, I said, ‘We’re going to look at this as a foot-by-foot project.”

The same can be said about the Harbor Cleanup, a volunteer project organized by Georges River Land Trust and its Conservation Program Manager, Annette Naegel. What was collected by the small group of volunteers in Rockland will be added to the statistics for the entire International Coastal Cleanup happening simultaneously around the world.

Naegel brought some statistics with her to the event:

In 2013, International Coastal Cleanup volunteers picked up 2,043,470 cigarette butts — When laid end-to-end would be as tall as 133 Empire State Buildings.

In 2013, the volunteers collected 847,972 plastic bottle caps — enough to carpet three football fields.

Volunteers collected 940,170 plastic beverage bottles — enough beverage bottles to give every fan attending a Super Bowl game 11 sodas.

Volunteers collected enough fishing line to stretch up and over Mount Everest five times.