Canal Boat — February 2018

canalboat.co.uk Canal Boat February 2018 63

RESTORATION

funding) to get the canal open as far as

Crickheath. But already, the Montgomery

Waterway Restoration Trust has its sights

on the next landmark, the Welsh border at

Llanymynech. A funding appeal, a private

benefactor, and an IWA legacy will enable

volunteers and contractors to between

them tackle the last obstruction on this

length, a demolished bridge. Get the canal

open through to the border, and the

prospects for opening the difficult length

between there and the restored 12-mile

Welshpool section should improve.

Meanwhile in South Wales, WRG’s

volunteers are returning to Ty-Coch Locks

on the Monmouthshire Canal, a flight of

nine locks where restoration is well on the

way to completion, thanks to a local

volunteering project set up to give local

people the skills to get them into

employment. This year, Cabin Lock is

under restoration, and as well as working

on the lock itself, volunteers hope to also

carry out archaeological excavation of the

remains of former canalside buildings.

These locks form part of a programme

of work to open the canal up from

Newport north to Cwmbran. With the

canal already open from the north side of

Cwmbran all the way to Brecon, that will

help to make the case for the major

funding needed to open the difficult

section through Cwmbran town.

Eventually the aim is to also reopen the

canal’s Crumlin Arm as far as Cwmcarn,

and make a new link to the River Usk (and

so to the Severn estuary) in Newport.

Further west, WRG will be supporting

the Swansea Canal Society’s efforts to

restore the surviving six miles of the

canal. Work will concentrate on

completing repair and re-pointing of the

stone-built Trebanos Locks (worksite for

several camps in recent years) and move

on to Ynysmeudwy Locks further up the

valley. In the longer term, the aim is to

deal with obstructions (including filled-in

sections) enabling the six-mile length to be

reopened – and eventually to create a new

route down to Swansea Docks, and a link

to the Neath and Tennant canals.

On the English side of the border, the

Shrewsbury & Newport Canals Trust has a

new work-site for WRG’s volunteers at

Berwick Tunnel, not far from the

Shrewsbury end of the route. One of the

earliest tunnels of any significant length to

have been built with a towpath, its western

portal is in poor condition as a result of

damage from sizeable trees growing from

behind the head wall, and the volunteers

hope to clear the tree stumps, remove

vegetation, repair the walls, and improve

the nearby towpath.

This is part of the Trust’s plan to open

up this section of canal as part of an

accessible walk, which in turn aims to

attract more interest to its eventual plans

to reopen the entire route from

Shrewsbury to the Shropshire Union Main

Line at Norbury.

THE SOUTH

Down on the Cotswold Canals, WRG’s

volunteers are supporting a project which

is rather closer to the currently navigable

network – just a few yards away from it, in

fact. At Inglesham Lock, the Thames &

Severn Canal meets the River Thames

• and the lock is being completely rebuilt,
  thanks to funding from an IWA Appeal
  which raised over £100,000. So far, one
  lock wall and one wing wall have been
  completed; this year it’s hoped to rebuild
  the second lock wall and wing wall.
  Much of the Cotswold Canals Trust’s

Lock wall repair at Trebanos, Swansea Canal

Rebuilding Inglesham lock, Cotswold Canals

Laying paths on the Wey & Arun Canal