Canal Boat – July 2018

12 July 2018 Canal Boat canalboat.co.uk

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T

he Scottish Lowland canals were

seen as one of the great success

stories of the waterway restoration

movement – and in terms of mileage

and cost, the greatest achievement of the

‘Millennium Boom’ series of waterway

openings. The Forth & Clyde Canal had been

abandoned in the 1960s when the

inconvenience of all the opening bridges was

felt to outweigh its usefulness for getting

small sea-going vessels from coast to coast

(and inland pleasure boating had yet to catch

on), while the Union Canal’s link to Edinburgh

had been severed even earlier by the

demolition of the connecting flight of locks

near Falkirk. Following many years of

campaigning and local revivals and

reopenings by groups such as the Linlithgow

Union Canal Society and the Forth & Clyde

Canal Society, both canals were completed –

including new road crossings, reinstatement

of filled-in sections, and diversions around

obstructions – at a cost of the best part of

£100m, thanks to the Millennium Fund,

European and Scottish funding. The crowning

achievement was the opening in 2002 of the

remarkable Falkirk Wheel, the world’s only

rotating boat lift and a new Scottish icon, at

the heart of a reborn canal system which

connected the country’s two greatest cities to

its East and West coasts – and looked to have

a bright future.

But just 16 years on, Scottish and UK

waterways organisations are portraying a

very different picture – of a canal system

starved of cash by Scottish Canals (the

Scottish Government body which took

responsibility when English and Welsh

waterways transferred to the Canal & River

Trust), with numerous closures caused by

failures of locks and bridges, uncontrolled

weed growth and rubbish deterring boats,

staff cuts severely limiting opening times (as

all locks are operated by SC), and fears that

the canals are slipping back towards the

dereliction of the previous 40 years.

Is this an accurate summary of the state of

the canals? There have certainly been some

problems with them recently. Earlier this year

the Inland Waterways Association

highlighted two indefinite closures of power

NEWSSPECIAL

SCOTTISH LOWLAND CANALS:

IN CRISIS?

Waterways campaigners and boating groups fear that the Union and Forth &

Clyde canals could be slipping back into dereliction - but Scottish Canals

says it’s working towards a sustainable future. So who’s right?

Canal supporters fear that the closures are

damaging waterside and hireboat businesses