Shadowed Eyes

Photo of a canal lined on each side by trees in their autumnal finery. In the middle distance the canal narrows where a now missing swing bridge once spanned the canal. Through the gap can be seen a white, two-storey canal-side residence.

Bridgeless bridge hole on the Grand Union (used to be bridge 30, so bridge numbering here is a tad discontiguous now). 'Tis the season of colourful trees and, therefore, constant clearing of leaves from my leaf magnet prop 😠
#boatlife
#ukcanals #narrowboat
#KeepCanalsAlive #FundBritainsWaterways

4/4
Meanwhile, the early 19th-century original can still be seen next to the working lock, though now it is blocked at either end and, but for a rusting old barge, empty.

3/4
Most have now been filled in, leaving unusually wide grassy expanses to the side of the surviving lock and the occasional, now curious-looking double-arched bridge. This one at Stoke Bruerne top lock not only survives, but remains in use.

2/4
The double lock here is one of the few to survive, in structure at least, the 1830s duplication of several locks from here southward. It was a vain attempt to stave off competition from the railways, and nearly all duplicate locks were out of use by the 1850s.

Photo of historic canal-side brick and stone buildings lit at night. On each side of the canal, above a functioning lock next to a decommissioned lock, there is a narrowboat moored.

🧵1/4
Canalside cottages opposite the Boat Inn, top lock at Stoke Bruerne on the Grand Union. Inn appears to predate the canal, having been built in the 18th century, whilst the canal followed at the turn of the century
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#KeepCanalsAlive #FundBritainsWaterways

Photo of a blue narrowboat approaching along a canal against a backdrop of leafless trees lit by a setting sun on a cloudless spring day

Crept into my fourth year of liveaboard continuous cruising last week. Nights drawing in now, fourth winter approaches.

Pic: The very splendid Ashby Canal last April, before drought confined me to the Grand Union

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#ukcanals #canal #narrowboat
#KeepCanalsAlive #FundBritainsWaterways

3/3
The bridge is listed grade II*, and the description in it's Historic England listing delights to such architectural exoticisms as 'blank cusped panels', 'quatrefoil frieze' and 'ogee half-cupolas'

2/3
The unusually (for a canal bridge) ornate design is probably the result of the canal being cut through or close to the property of a wealthy landowner who had the clout to insist upon such niceties.

Photo of an unusually ornate and decorative canal bridge built from dressed limestone.

🧵1/3
In 1793, digging began on the c.90-mile Grand Junction Canal (now part of the Grand Union) at both northern and southern ends. Seven years later, the two stretches met at this bridge in Cosgrove.
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#KeepCanalsAlive #FundBritainsWaterways

8/8
</cynic mode disengaged>

7/8
Which, sadly, is pretty much still the case today, though successive governments have become a lot more sly in not properly funding our waterways heritage by successfully inserting the Canal & River Trust between themselves and any blame for the inevitable decline caused by inadequate funding.

6/8
The beams are built to a steel-based design popular with the 1970s school of "Oh dear Lord the people are getting uppity about all the canals we've neglected, we need to do something, erm, cheap" Govt. thought on managing our waterways heritage.

5/8
<cynic mode engaged>

4/8
The lock gates there now are something of an anachronism, a decorative repurposing of old gates that were nevertheless clearly built long after the originals had completed their second life and ultimately become wood chippings and mulch.

3/8
A new aqueduct was completed in 1811, allowing the temporary cut and its locks to be retired for what is, so far, the final time, and everything useful that could be removed was put to good use elsewhere.

2/8
When the embankment and aqueduct over the river was completed in 1805, the temporary cut and its locks were abandoned, only to be returned back into use when the aqueduct suffered a catastrophic containment incident (to borrow from modern rocketry phraseology) in 1808.

Photo of a pair of old lock gates stuck open with the lock chamber beyond, viewed from the former canal bed which is now dry and overgrown.

🧵1/8
Abandoned lock on the original cut of the Grand Union, one of eight built 1800 to cross the River Great Ouse while the embankment that crosses it today (rising ground background left) was being built.
#boatlife
#ukcanals #canalheritage #narrowboat
#KeepCanalsAlive #FundBritainsWaterways

The return on the Govt investment in inland waterways of £52.6m p.a. was estimated in 2022 at £4.6bn p.a. in equivalent social value, including £1.1bn cost savings to the NHS, plus £1.5bn p.a. of economic value to the nation.

As a result, CRT is required to spend an average £19m per year on reservoir works (£27m in 2024 alone), accounting in large part for annual Major Infrastructure Works spend increasing from an average £22m per year in the 5 years before Toddbrook to an average £50m per year in the 5 years afterwards

A second, bigger hit on funds available for general maintenance came with the Govt. tightening of reservoir standards following the failure of the Toddbrook reservoir in 2019.

The immediate reduction in public funding when the CRT took over was compounded after 2021, when the grant ceased to be adjusted for inflation each year. This is eroding the spending power of the grant by an average of £6m per year from 2022, and by nearly £10m in 2024.

If the CRT had received the same proportion of public funding as the BW 11-year average, CRT revenue in 2024 would have been £270m. It was actually £237m.

In its last 11 years, British Waterways received an average of £60m of public funding per year (33% of average revenue) for its waterways in England & Wales. In its first 11 years, the CRT has received an average of £49m of public funding per year (24% of revenue).

Until the narrative becomes "this would be a disaster for the Government" and "decline of infrastructure due to lack of funding", the future for our inland waterways looks grim 🙁
#ukcanals
#KeepCanalsAlive #FundBritainsWaterways

Reservoir watch | Managing our water This is the best place to find out the latest information about Canal & River Trust’s reservoirs.

August reservoir holdings report is out
canalrivertrust.org.uk/specialist-t...
Five reservoir groups are at historical lowest, while those supplying the K&A, GU sth, Lanc, Chesterfield, Grantham, BCN and S&W are still more than half full
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Photo of a pair of old working narrowboats breasted up as they exit a lock

Motor Nuneaton and butty Brighton, built 1936 for the Grand Union Canal Carrying Company to carry cargo between the London ports and the midlands, now owned by the Narrow Boat Trust www.narrowboattrust.org.uk
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#KeepCanalsAlive #FundBritainsWaterways

Aye. There's a low water advice notice out now for the marina. Did you have any trouble getting through York St. lock into the basin? Could not shift the top gate at all on my own earlier this year.

Hirers are the lifeblood of the canals. And these managed to negotiate an exit from a wide like with one gate inoperable without touching that gate.

CRT sorted the water out on the bottom end of the S&W then? Any idea on what caused it?

Photo of a pair of narrowboats with the same blue, red and yellow colour scheme travelling together towards a lock entrance partially obscured by a willow tree, watched by customers sat outside a canal-side pub under a blue summer sky.

Followed this hire boat pair as they shared the locks at Stoke Bruerne on the Grand Union. Such a pleasure to hear them happily swapping stories about their adventures and brief encounters touching ground in low water.
#boatlife
#ukcanals #canal #narrowboat
#KeepCanalsAlive #FundBritainsWaterways