Bridgewater Canal Breach

[frangar]

17 minutes ago, robtheplod said:

 

Wow. I’m surprised or maybe not that peel haven’t been more proactive with some coffer dams…..Maybe they only need the water as a feature outside the expensive flats…..

[magnetman]

Surely once you have sold the flats it makes no difference. 

One thing which is definitely not written down in the contract when buying a property is the view out of the windows. 

[Mike Tee]

The more footage I see of this failure, the more I'm coming to the thought that it will never reopen. It will drag on for years over arguments about who is financially liable. By the time it is finally decided the cost will have risen to the point where it is just not financially viable. I hope I'm wrong.

[frangar]

34 minutes ago, magnetman said:

Surely once you have sold the flats it makes no difference. 

One thing which is definitely not written down in the contract when buying a property is the view out of the windows. 

Ahhh but they have a lot of land in the bank that’s yet to be built on…..

1 minute ago, Mike Tee said:

The more footage I see of this failure, the more I'm coming to the thought that it will never reopen. It will drag on for years over arguments about who is financially liable. By the time it is finally decided the cost will have risen to the point where it is just not financially viable. I hope I'm wrong.

I share your thoughts especially given Peels record as a company. 

[Tony Brooks]

1 minute ago, Mike Tee said:

The more footage I see of this failure, the more I'm coming to the thought that it will never reopen. It will drag on for years over arguments about who is financially liable. By the time it is finally decided the cost will have risen to the point where it is just not financially viable. I hope I'm wrong.

 

my thoughts along those lines is that Peel see advantage in not stopping further damage, and that is why they did not do much to completely stop the flow, so I agree this may be deliberate.

[magnetman]

I don't know what the situation is about people living there but IF there are issues with the formation of non approved Boat communities on the canal the owners may take the view that making the canal unusable is a Good Thing. 

 

It would depend on business objectives. 

 

 

 

 

[IanD]

12 minutes ago, Mike Tee said:

The more footage I see of this failure, the more I'm coming to the thought that it will never reopen. It will drag on for years over arguments about who is financially liable. By the time it is finally decided the cost will have risen to the point where it is just not financially viable. I hope I'm wrong.

That's pretty much what I said. Unlike CART who do have a mission to preserve and keep open the canals and a financial backstop which is the government (if they go bust), Peel are a commercial company who make decisions based on profit and loss. If they don't have any legal obligation to keep the Bridgewater open by fixing the breach (which AFIK is the case), what's the incentive to them to spend an enormous sum -- certainly millions, perhaps >£10M? -- to do this, when they will never recover the cost (e.g. from license fees?) in the foreseeable future?

 

The only option I can see apart from closure would be for Peel to sell the Bridgewater to CART, who then find funding from somewhere (the government?) to fix the breach, on the grounds of preserving the canal system.

Edited January 3, 2025 by IanD

[Arthur Marshall]

Wouldn't it be logical from CRTs point of view to close off their ends of the canal entirely at the stop locks? They must lose water from the T&M into it and they won't want that as a constant drain.

[IanD]

Just now, Arthur Marshall said:

Wouldn't it be logical from CRTs point of view to close off their ends of the canal entirely at the stop locks? They must lose water from the T&M into it and they won't want that as a constant drain.

But don't Peel own everything up to and including Castlefield Basin? The only thing CART could do here is close/lock Duke's Lock.

 

Not sure what CART could do at the other end(s) of the Bridgewater, either way it's a massive stretch of canal to allow to drain down... 😞

 

[billh]

40 minutes ago, Arthur Marshall said:

Wouldn't it be logical from CRTs point of view to close off their ends of the canal entirely at the stop locks? They must lose water from the T&M into it and they won't want that as a constant drain.

 

No, the lockage water from the Rochdale and Cheshire locks has to go somewhere, the Bridgewater is the obvious place. Dutton stop lock maintains the level between there and Middlewich. Anything other than lockage is down to C&RT water control. As far as I know , the Bridgewater has a legal right to C&RT lockage water anyway. Do you think it would be better if the water went to waste over the various overflow weirs  (eg at Anderton) on the  northern T &M?

[sniffy]

1 hour ago, magnetman said:

Surely once you have sold the flats it makes no difference. 

One thing which is definitely not written down in the contract when buying a property is the view out of the windows. 

Thinking of the new build estate in Lymm, "Narrowboat view", currently in the process of being built, is below the level of the canal, I Wonder what insurance companies will be thinking now and what additional work Bellway Homes (the builders) will now have to look to ensure no failure on that section of the canal. They have carried out extensive piling and excavation work next to the canal over the last few months

Edited January 3, 2025 by sniffy

[b00ke23]

3 hours ago, IanD said:

That's pretty much what I said. Unlike CART who do have a mission to preserve and keep open the canals and a financial backstop which is the government (if they go bust), Peel are a commercial company who make decisions based on profit and loss. If they don't have any legal obligation to keep the Bridgewater open by fixing the breach (which AFIK is the case), what's the incentive to them to spend an enormous sum -- certainly millions, perhaps >£10M?

 

The Middlewich breach cost £3M....so close to £4M in todays money. And this is much much worse than that, so your £10M estimate is probably close to the mark. 

 

Of course if they could get some cofferdams in it would help.....judging by the erosion caused by the continuing water loss, the bill goes up by a few hundred thousand pounds for every hour they're not in place. 

Edited January 3, 2025 by booke23

[Liam]

The canal company is currently arranging for a cofferdamn to be installed closer to the breach site as soon as the embankment finishes moving, which it's currently doing at the moment. Only this morning a further crack appeared down the middle of the towpath for 50ft or so.

 

Once the damn is in place it'll enable the re-watering of the length from Agden Bridge to just north of the winding hole by the Swan with 2 Nicks, and on the northern side, from the current limit at Back Lane bridge upto the start of the aqueduct. This will mean the currently stranded boats can be refloated again.

 

And once that's done then work can start on rebuilding the canal. This point was made perfectly clear by both the engineer and manager. Sorry to disappoint all you nay sayers and glass half full types!

 

Edited January 3, 2025 by Liam

[haggis]

Good news and thanks for the update, Liam.

[IanD]

5 minutes ago, haggis said:

Good news and thanks for the update, Liam.

Indeed. It would be even better if there was a statement from Peel that they were committed to keeping the canal open, because I think a lot of people are worried that they won't do this because of the cost.

[Liam]

Just now, IanD said:

Indeed. It would be even better if there was a statement from Peel that they were committed to keeping the canal open, because I think a lot of people are worried that they won't do this because of the cost.

Agreed but not really suprising. There's a very small team that makes up the Bridgewater Canal Co and they're spending their time wisely organising the way forward and carrying out welfare checks on the current boaters in the drained section. They can't do everything at once unfortunately.

[Pluto]

Is Brian Houlton still alive? No one knew the canal and its engineering better than him.

[Liam]

25 minutes ago, Pluto said:

Is Brian Houlton still alive? No one knew the canal and its engineering better than him.

Unfortunately not, neither is Eric Snr, Eric Jnr is the assistant engineer now.

[IanD]

31 minutes ago, Liam said:

Agreed but not really suprising. There's a very small team that makes up the Bridgewater Canal Co and they're spending their time wisely organising the way forward and carrying out welfare checks on the current boaters in the drained section. They can't do everything at once unfortunately.

But this isn't the responsibility of a small team doing the work, it's down to Peel top management to decide what their strategy is -- spend a big pile of money to fix the breach, or give up and close the canal. The sum is going to be big enough that they should already be discussing this as a matter of urgency, they don't need any details from the guys at the coal face.

[b00ke23]

I see The Peel Group made over £140M last year so they can certainly afford it.  

[Ianws]

From Wikipedia, it's probably a forensic exercise to work  out what they own and what they are worth.

Business structure

edit

The Peel Group has a complex business structure, consisting of 342 registered and active companies and subsidiaries excluding Peel Ports in the UK. Its ultimate parent company is the Isle of Man-based Tokenhouse Ltd.^[73]

[TheBiscuits]

1 hour ago, IanD said:

But this isn't the responsibility of a small team doing the work, it's down to Peel top management to decide what their strategy is -- spend a big pile of money to fix the breach, or give up and close the canal. The sum is going to be big enough that they should already be discussing this as a matter of urgency, they don't need any details from the guys at the coal face.

 

Except if they close the Bridgewater Canal they also have to shut the Manchester Ship Canal ... The right of navigation in the Irwell Valley is tied to the Bridgewater Canal, which is why Peel wanted it enough to buy out Manchester council as was. 

 

It was only the fact that it was already in public ownership (the council) that prevented it being included with the other canals in the 1968 act.

 

[Ianws]

2 minutes ago, TheBiscuits said:

 

Except if they close the Bridgewater Canal they also have to shut the Manchester Ship Canal ... The right of navigation in the Irwell Valley is tied to the Bridgewater Canal, which is why Peel wanted it enough to buy out Manchester council as was. 

 

It was only the fact that it was already in public ownership (the council) that prevented it being included with the other canals in the 1968 act.

 

There's not much traffic on the ship canal but it's not going away anytime soon. 

[IanD]

8 hours ago, booke23 said:

I see The Peel Group made over £140M last year so they can certainly afford it.  

The issue is not whether they can afford it, it's whether it makes business sense for them to repair it as opposed to closing it. Assuming they are legally allowed to close it, which may or may not be the case... 😉

[frangar]

9 hours ago, IanD said:

But this isn't the responsibility of a small team doing the work, it's down to Peel top management to decide what their strategy is -- spend a big pile of money to fix the breach, or give up and close the canal. The sum is going to be big enough that they should already be discussing this as a matter of urgency, they don't need any details from the guys at the coal face.

I would have also thought an organisation like Peel would have a marketing and PR dept….which if they have makes CRT look positively proactive in that dept…sort of adds to the theory that while the Bridgewater Canal dept of the company wants it sorted the higher management….and let’s face it the holders of the purse strings….may well not.