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C & R T ANNOUNCES FURTHER MEASURES TO CONSERVE WATER AS EXCEPTIONALLY DRY WEATHER CONTINUES


Ray T

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press release

23 July 2018

 

CANAL & RIVER TRUST ANNOUNCES FURTHER MEASURES TO CONSERVE WATER AS EXCEPTIONALLY DRY WEATHER CONTINUES

 

The Canal & River Trust has announced a further package of measures on targeted sections of its canals to manage the severe water shortages it is facing in parts of Northern England as the exceptionally dry weather continues. 

 

June was the third driest month since records began in 1910 and this has continued into July, placing extra pressure on reservoir holdings and depleting other sources of water that feed the canal network.

 

Although more than 95% of the Trust’s 2,000 miles of waterways are currently still open for boaters to use, the Trust has had to implement restrictions on parts of its northern waterways. Heightened restrictions were introduced on the Leeds & Liverpool Canal in June to conserve water and plans to temporarily close part of the canal to boats, between Wigan and Gargrave, from Monday 30 July were recently announced.

 

With reservoirs continuing to drain at abnormal rates, the Trust is now implementing further measures as water supplies for the Huddersfield Narrow, Rochdale, Peak Forest and Macclesfield Canals reach minimum levels.

 

Although the Trust has been carefully managing the water feed from its own reservoirs, and maximising the amount of water it is entitled to take from the third party-owned reservoirs which feed both the Rochdale Canal and Huddersfield Narrow Canal, the lack of rainfall has meant that this has not halted the decline in water levels.

 

Under normal weather conditions the Rochdale Canal is also supplemented by feeder streams and rivers. However, the flows from these feeder streams have also been depleted.

  

With no change in the weather the Trust is reluctantly closing sections of the Rochdale Canal and Huddersfield Narrow Canal to boats from Monday 6 August. The closure on the Rochdale Canal will take effect between locks 1 and 48 (from Sowerby Bridge to Littleborough) – with the exception of a short stretch between locks 6 and 19 (east of Mytholmroyd to Todmorden) where navigation through locks will be restricted to the period between 10am and 2pm under a local booking system.

 

The Huddersfield Narrow Canal will be closed to boats between locks 24 West to 1 East (from above Uppermill across to Huddersfield).

 

Overnight restrictions are being introduced on the Macclesfield Canal from today, 23 July, on the Bosley Flight (locks 1 to 12)  where use will be limited to the period between 8am and 2pm. Whilst this will conserve water in the short term, the Trust is also warning boaters that it expects to have to temporarily close the Canal at Bosley, and in addition – on the Peak Forest Canal - will need to close off access to Bugsworth Basin, both from Monday 13 August. The Marple Flight (locks 1 to 16) on the Peak Forest Canal is already closed due to movement in the lock walls at Lock 11 and will remain closed until they can be re-built.  Boating on the Lower Peak Forest (below Marple) and Lower Macclesfield Canals (below Bosley) will remain unrestricted.

 

It’s not clear how long these closures will have to last for, but it’s likely to be throughout August, and potentially beyond if there is no significant, sustained rainfall. While the closures will prevent use of these stretches of canal by boats, they can still be used by anglers and canoeists and the towpaths will remain open for people - visitors and the local community alike - to enjoy.

 

The Trust will continue to work with boating businesses in the affected areas to put contingency plans into place so that people can still enjoy a boating holiday. The Trust is also publishing maps detailing where restrictions or temporary closures are in place so that boaters can plan their summer’s cruising.

 

Jon Horsfall, head of Customer Service Support for the Canal & River Trust, said; “There’s just no getting away from the fact that we haven’t had enough rain and that’s affecting our ability to supply certain sections of canal in the North with the water they need.

 

“We’ve been trying to make the water last as long as possible by restricting opening times but each time a boat goes through a lock it uses around 300,000 litres of water. Without rainfall to replenish our reservoirs it’s becoming a real challenge to provide these vast quantities of water in some parts of the northern network.

 

“Of course, visitors and the local community can still enjoy the towpath, canoeists can go for a paddle and anglers can fish on their local canal. Boaters too can still make limited use of lock-free sections, or venture further afield to unaffected parts of the network.

 

“We’re continuing to work with boaters and boating businesses to try and minimise the impact on them as much as we possibly can, including giving them information to help plan their cruising. We’d like to thank them for their help and understanding in these exceptional circumstances and can assure them that we will re-open canals for boats to use as soon as the water supply is back to a sufficient level.”

 

Boaters can help conserve water by:

·         Sharing locks where possible and making the best use of the water available.

·         Ensuring paddles are fully closed once they’ve passed through a lock.

·         Aiming for minimal contact with gates so that they don’t cause any minor damage which could increase leakage when navigating through locks, by ensuring gates are fully open before they pass through.

 

To find out more about how the Trust manages its water, including water management FAQs and a monthly Reservoir Watch go to www.canalrivertrust.org.uk/specialist-teams/managing-our-water.

 

 

-ENDS-

 

For further media requests please contact: Stephen Hardy on 07920 077190 or email stephen.hardy@canalrivertrust.org.uk

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Why the **** ****  does CaRT have to cover everything with verbiage exonerating them from (whatever) situations?

Just say "There are water shortages in some areas as a result of no rainfall" and leave it at that.

 

Sorry guys there's been no rain for xx months so we'll have to close / restric the usage on some canals which are:-

 

xxx

xxx

xxx

Here are some tips that can help in conserving limited water -

Sharer a bat with a friend

Stay where you are

whatever.

 

Message ends???   

  • Greenie 1
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10 minutes ago, OldGoat said:

Why the **** ****  does CaRT have to cover everything with verbiage exonerating them from (whatever) situations?

Just say "There are water shortages in some areas as a result of no rainfall" and leave it at that.

 

Sorry guys there's been no rain for xx months so we'll have to close / restric the usage on some canals which are:-

 

xxx

xxx

xxx

Here are some tips that can help in conserving limited water -

Sharer a bat with a friend

Stay where you are

whatever.

 

Message ends???   

Well it is a bit lengthy meaning fewer people are likely to read it. Credit for the detail but there is such a thing as going overboard as you alluded to.

 

Interesting you mention boats could in theory stay where they are in order to help with water conservation. If they were to do this even in the areas concerned, there would be less movement of boats and subsequently more water conserved. Seems like a win win, or not?

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17 minutes ago, OldGoat said:

Why the **** ****  does CaRT have to cover everything with verbiage exonerating them from (whatever) situations?

Just say "There are water shortages in some areas as a result of no rainfall" and leave it at that.

 

Sorry guys there's been no rain for xx months so we'll have to close / restric the usage on some canals which are:-

 

xxx

xxx

xxx

Here are some tips that can help in conserving limited water -

Sharer a bat with a friend

Stay where you are

whatever.

 

Message ends???   

Bear in mind it is a press release, you are not the intended recipient.  From that press release some hack who may never have seen a canal will make up a story.  So you try to give enough words to guide them in something that has a element of positivity in it, any organisation is going to do that,  it is the same with all press releases.

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At least they haven't given the advice they did in 1976, which was to wait for 30 minutes at each lock that wasn't in your favour, in case another boat could make better use of the water.

 

Given how much most locks leak these days, you would be waiting for 30 minutes at all locks unless you met a boat leaving the lock!

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2 hours ago, cuthound said:

At least they haven't given the advice they did in 1976, which was to wait for 30 minutes at each lock that wasn't in your favour, in case another boat could make better use of the water.

 

Given how much most locks leak these days, you would be waiting for 30 minutes at all locks unless you met a boat leaving the lock!

Good point. I have just walked the Claydon Flight on the South Oxford (subject of another thread here) and three of the five locks are leaking very badly. I took the opportunity to take a break at the bottom lock and timed the rate of leakage after a boat left. From full to empty was less than twenty five minutes. 

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On 23/07/2018 at 21:30, mayalld said:

A boat passing through a narrow lock does NOT use 330,000 Litres of Water, it uses 130,000 Litres

 

Let us consider the leak at Bollington;

 

The length between the stop planks is around 900 metres. The canal there is around 10 Metres across, and let us assume an average depth of 1 metre.

 

Just to refill that length after it was drained down is 9 million litres of water, or around 70 locks.

 

So just to empty and refill the leaking section is 70 locks of water. The stop planks went in because the canal was leaking badly, and it drained pretty much completely in 24 hours from the planks going in.

 

That means that for each day from when the leak developed until the stop planks went in, 70 locks of water were probably being lost. I believe that there were at least 2 days of substantial leakage before the planks went in, so at least 200 locks of water lost due to a leak that CRT KNEW about for two years and didn't fix.

 

Then look at Bosley. The leaking gates at lock number 2 (which they knew about last winter) meant that boats were having to flush extra water down lock 1 to get through. On average each boat was taking 2 locks of water down the flight instead of 1.

 

Let's assume 20 boats a day pass through from April to June, 30 daily in July and August and 20 daily in September.

 

From 1/4 to 30/6 = 1820 locks of water wasted.

 

From 1/7 to 11/7 when they fixed it = another 330 wasted.

 

So, there we have it, due to a failure to maintain, they have wasted 2,350 locks of water

 

Again, assuming the same lockage rate, they need 510 locks of water to keep Bosley open until the end of August and 600 for the whole of September, and another 620 for October.

 

So, but for the waste caused by poor maintenance, there would have been enough

 

See Dave, we can at least agree on something! ?

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On 23/07/2018 at 19:06, Ray T said:

press release

23 July 2018

 

CANAL & RIVER TRUST ANNOUNCES FURTHER MEASURES TO CONSERVE WATER AS EXCEPTIONALLY DRY WEATHER CONTINUES

 

 

 

“Of course, visitors and the local community can still enjoy the towpath, canoeists can go for a paddle and anglers can fish on their local canal. 

Good to see that they aren’t inconveniencing the free loaders.  ?

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