YESTERDAY, THURSDAY, an extra mile was added to the Stroudwater Canal.
Extra mile
As members of the Cotswold Canals Trust switched on a pump to feed an extra mile of waterway, Janet Friend reports.
It was the the National Lottery Heritage Fund Board of Trustees who joined the trust to turn on the pump to fill the pound between John Robinson Lock and Dock Lock.
This being the first section of waterway since part of it was filled in by the construction of the M5 in the 1960s.
Volunteers of the trust have worked for months to prepare what was a derelict mile of waterway for it to once again be in water and eventually navigable to Saul Junction where it will join the Gloucester & Sharpness Canal.
Cancelled the plan
Under the old British Waterways there was a plan to restore the waterway between the Thames and the Severn but the then new Canal & River Trust cancelled the plan.