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Canal charity launches new pontoon in Wigan


Ray T

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6 December 2017
 
CANAL CHARITY LAUNCHES NEW PONTOON IN WIGAN

Boaters and canoeists are set to benefit from a new £80,000 pontoon at Wigan.  This joint project between Canal & River Trust and the charity’s Desmond Family Canoe Trail programme is great news for boaters and canoeists exploring the historic Leeds & Liverpool Canal.

The 30-metre long pontoon is next to the Trust’s new office at Trencherfield Mill in a perfect spot for getting to the restaurants, bars and shops in Wigan town centre and to nearby transport links.  Twenty metres of the pontoon have been designed for boaters to use, with 10 metres built at a lower level suitable for kayaks and canoes.  The entire pontoon is DDA friendly.

Boaters will be able to moor on the pontoon for up to 24 hours.  There is a water point available in the vicinity and in the coming months the Trust is aiming to install a waste facility and CCTV.

The Desmond Family Canoe Trail is the longest of its kind in the UK, stretching for 162 miles from Liverpool to Goole along the Leeds & Liverpool Canal and Aire & Calder Navigation.  The pontoon will offer canoeists paddling the trail a convenient point to disembark and take a break at Wigan – about a quarter of the way along the route from Liverpool – and is next to the project’s canalside Wigan hub on Pottery Road, where the team run canoeing sessions and activities for young people aged 16-25 years old

Greg Brookes, programme manager for Canal & River Trust’s Desmond Family Canoe Trail, said: “We wanted to create a new hub on the 162-mile trail in Wigan on the Leeds & Liverpool Canal.  Wigan’s perfectly positioned for canoeists to stop, stock up and relax in.  We wanted a new pontoon here to enable canoeists easy access both onto, and getting out of, the water.  

“This pontoon is also an important resource for boaters who want to get to Wigan Pier and a place to moor during their visit to our office in Trencherfield Mill.  As a charity we are continually looking for opportunities to improve the waterways, with help from everyone who uses them, lives on them or visits.  This is a good example of the type of enhancements we can make if we work together.”

For further information about the Desmond Family Canoe Trail and how to get involved please contact the team at: Coastto.Coast@canalrivertrust.org.uk.  

ENDS 

For further media requests please contact: 
Fran Read, national press officer, Canal & River Trust 
m 07796 610 427 e fran.read@canalrivertrust.org.uk 
 

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Twenty metres is hardly a major new mooring facility-  typically two  boats at most- and if it also has to allow a short-term space for access to the waste facility there will not even be that.

Anyone got any piccies?

N

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Anything is good, but at 20metres its not even long enough for one boat if its 70 foot.

In addition to mooring it would be nice to have a pontoon as a lock landing just there. Its quite difficult to get off to get to the lock, Gillie steers the front in and I hop up onto the towpath, using my hands to assist whilst trying not to get my fingers run over by cyclists. Must be really difficult if you are single handed.

Wigan is really sad, my heart sinks everytime we go through, lots of canal frontage and a few good historic buildings but all going to waste, the pubs shut, evidence of previous "regenerations" slipping back to urban wasteland, and now the very half baked "Wigan Pier quarter".

............Dave

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The new pontoon has been positioned below the dry dock lock where the towpath walls are are very high. There is one water point there and I can only assume that CaRT intend to put waste disposal bins in the adjacent yard.

If anyone does moor on the pontoon they will be blocking access to the water point and waste disposal site.

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14 hours ago, dmr said:

.

Wigan is really sad, my heart sinks every time we go through, the pubs shut

They have been replaced by "bars" as mentioned in the CART blurbsheet, just as no one seems to build flats any more, they have been replaced by "apartments" which have the same relationship: they're exactly the same but more expensive.

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