One open two to go

THE damaged culvert under the Leeds & Liverpool Canal at Rishton has now been repaired with the waterway again open for navigation.

However, this still leaves the Rochdale and Shropshire Union canals closed where failures have happened, Keith Gudgin reminds us.

Culvert failure

The Rochdale was closed at Mytholmroyd in late October (Rochdale Canal failure) again through a culvert failure, with no date given for its reopening.

Again it was the failure of a culvert under the Shropshire Union (Shropshire Union failure) near the National Waterways Museum at Ellesmere Port. Being the end of the waterway however this is not causing any great disruption.

With three such failures in a matter of weeks, following others, it would seem the 200 years old culverts have passed their 'shelf life', so perhaps an urgent program of inspection is warranted, and certainly not the present regime of inspection that obviously does not work.