The shut-down starts

Published: Monday, 02 August 2010

TODAY, Monday, sees the complete shut-down of around 70 miles of the Leeds & Liverpool Canal, caused we are told by lack of rainfall.

Yet boaters who have contacted our office are convinced that this closure could have been averted if only proper maintenance of the canal had been carried out preventing the reservoirs being drained by the many leaks in the waterway.

Lock gates, crumbling banks and badly neglected paddle gear have been a big factor in the loss of water from this canal, as 46 photographs in our State of the waterways clearly show.   And though British Waterways may tell us that it is the lack of rainfall, these photographs, more than anything, show what is draining the reservoirs.

So the entire length of the waterway from Lock 30 at Gargrave  to Lock 85 at Wigan is now closed, and of course its water is draining away.

The picture on the left shows Gargrave Top Lock, which will help drain the pound, whilst the one below shows Wigan Bottom Lock, which will certainly help drain the flight!

All the flights are padlocked and stop planks installed in an attempt to conserve water, but of course, so many leaking lock gates will cause the flights to empty, and in fact British Waterways admits this in its statement: 'Please be advised that pounds will naturally drain once the feed from the reservoirs is no longer in place'.

Finish on the bottom

Boaters trapped in this stoppage should allow plenty of slack on their mooring ropes, as many will finish up on the bottom.

It is boater Lesley Carter, who made the suggestion:

"While the locks are not in use and stop boards are in, it is a golden opportunity for British Waterways to repair some of the badly maintained locks so that when, and if, they reopen this year there will be no vast loss of water which seems to have created the present situation.

"But as usual BW will probably sit around instead of trying to rectify this self inflicted problem. Restrictions were imposed on the canal at Spring Bank Holiday in May so they were aware that there was a potential a problem then, and the locks had only been open a month. They possibly already knew what would happen but still carried on with their plans to build new moorings in Liverpool and other hare-brained ideas at a cost that could have been put into the repair budget."

Lesley was one of those boaters who went on radio and was interviewed by newspaper reporters, and told the real cause of the stoppage.

In addition to boaters being unable to cruise, many businesses, marinas and hire companies are of course affected by this closure.