News

  • Donation to steam narrowboat President honours renowned boatbuilder

    Donation to steam narrowboat President honours renowned boatbuilder

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    IWA Lichfield Branch has donated £2000 in memory of Malcolm Braine, founding member of Staffordshire & Worcestershire Canal Society. The donation to the Black Country Living Museum will support the current restoration work and design and installation of a new boiler for President – one of the world’s few surviving boats of its kind and…

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  • Raising a family on the cut!

    Raising a family on the cut!

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    Alice Griffin meets the Burr family: IT WAS on an early morning back in 2011 while working a narrowboat down the Oxford Summit towards Napton as part of a family holiday that Tim and Julie Burr decided they had to make the canals their home. Julie told me: “Tim’s parents regularly holidayed on the canals…

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  • Double win for Finsley Gate Wharf scheme

    Double win for Finsley Gate Wharf scheme

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    NEW craft apprentices are being trained in rare heritage skills by the Canal & River Trust in a double win at Burnley’s Finsley Gate Wharf development. Located on the Leeds & Liverpool Canal, the 220-year-old former boatyard and canal office have recently been renovated and transformed into a successful restaurant and cafe bar, function room,…

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  • Sculptor’s great canal journeys

    Sculptor’s great canal journeys

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    Words and photos: Tim Coghlan Actors and boaters Tim and Pru are not the only ones to make Great Canal Journeys. And whereas those engaging octogenarians have now retired from the fray, Sculptor – the octogenarian historic narrowboat owned and operated by the Canal Museum at Stoke Bruerne – is once again out and about,…

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  • New CEO for the Inland Waterways Association

    New CEO for the Inland Waterways Association

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    Dave Pearce will join IWA as CEO from 3rd January 2023. Dave will be working 17 hours a week for the association, and his appointment effectively completes the work of Jonathan Smith as Interim CEO at IWA. Dave has worked in the charity world for over twenty years as a Chief Executive (older people, working…

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  • The state of the waterways: a real-time picture

    The state of the waterways: a real-time picture

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    ALTHOUGH you may not have heard of it, Planet Patrol mobilised more than 1000 people to participate in its Autumn Water Watch to locations across the UK. Over three days in October, the environmental non-profit organisation co-ordinated the activities of concerned individuals who recorded a series of observations looking at the pollution levels in their…

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  • New land acquired for canal restoration

    New land acquired for canal restoration

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    A POPULAR stretch of restored canal between Chippenham and Lacock could be extended thanks to a new deal. The Wilts & Berks Canal Trust has already rebuilt more than a kilometre of the former waterway from Pewsham Locks to Double Bridge. It has now signed a lease with Wiltshire Council for an additional 500m stretch…

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  • IWA award prize money used to fund Buckingham Canal Society mosaic

    IWA award prize money used to fund Buckingham Canal Society mosaic

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    IN OCTOBER 2022, around 50 people attended the unveiling of a kingfisher mosaic on the restored bridge over the Buckingham Canal at Cosgrove. The mosaic was created by local artist Melanie Watts and funded by the Christopher Power Prize money awarded by IWA to Athina Beckett in 2020. The Christopher Power Prize is awarded to…

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  • New year brings fresh ideas and opportunities

    New year brings fresh ideas and opportunities

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    FOR many of us, the new year will see us set ourselves a series of resolutions that we don’t always keep up. This year set yourself one that you will enjoy continuing with, if you find the right setting, right people and right times for yourself. Let IWA help you find these and help you…

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  • Funding secured for next stage of Lichfield Canal restoration

    Funding secured for next stage of Lichfield Canal restoration

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    THE Lichfield Canal will move a step closer to restoration with funding of £116,200 secured for work at the Darnford Moors section of the canal. Lichfield and Hatherton Canals Restoration Trust (LHCRT) will use the money to create an ecology park. The European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) is providing £41,200 of the grant, with match…

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  • Winter works at Wigan

    Winter works at Wigan

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    EMERGENCY repairs have been taking place at Poolstock Lock No 2 on the Leigh branch of the Leeds & Liverpool Canal at Wigan in a bid to reduce water leakage. Pipework from the pumps used to pump water around the lock had to be removed, as was the safety fencing and then a fibre dam…

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  • Cotswold Canals book arrives by boat at launch party

    Cotswold Canals book arrives by boat at launch party

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    THE Cotswold Canals Trust recently held a launch with a difference when it transported a new book by boat from the printers along a restored stretch of canal. Celebrating the trust’s 50 years of restoring its canals, towpaths and environment, it is entitled Reviving the Cotswold Canals – A Golden Celebration; the Cotswold Canals Trust…

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  • Grotto delivers grub for food bank appeal 

    Grotto delivers grub for food bank appeal 

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    Mercia Marina, Derbyshire’s destination marina was once again the go-to for Santa and his special marina grotto this year. Over the weekends in December leading up to Christmas, children could visit the grotto free of charge to see Santa and his elves, post a letter to the big man himself, and even receive a present.…

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  • Canal charity and Chester zoo join forces to save rare trees

    Canal charity and Chester zoo join forces to save rare trees

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    A clump of rare native black poplar trees has been planted along the River Weaver Navigation, near Northwich, in Cheshire, in a joint rescue mission to preserve the species by the Canal & River Trust waterways and wellbeing charity and Chester Zoo. Black poplar trees would once have been a familiar sight on riverside woodlands…

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