C O N T E X T 9 9 : M A Y 2 0 0 7 27 assets. In the post-war years the inland waterways were the Cinderella of the transport system. With the virtual cessation of freight traffic, lock-keepers, bridge-keepers, warehousemen and boatmen were no longer needed in number; former canal company cottages were sold or demolished; dock facilities were abandoned; and hand-operated cranes and timber bridges were scrapped or occasionally replaced with mechanised steel ones. Despite these losses, a great deal of waterway heritage survived. In the 1960s the British public began to rediscover canals. The last three decades of the 20th century saw a substantial growth in leisure and property development on and along Britain’s inland waterways. Maintaining the waterways in use for leisure traffic has not been easy. Money is tight and leisure customers rightly demand a lot, especially if they have hired a boat for a week’s holiday. In the late 1980s British Waterways began to roll back the effects of decades of underinvestment and decay. In the 1990s a number of high-profile restoration campaigns also got under way. The Heritage Lottery Fund’s grant in support of restoring the Kennet and Avon Canal was one of the largest of its time. In Scotland the Millennium Link project was a great success, having created jobs, investment and leisure opportunities for thousands of people to enjoy. The work of maintaining an expanding network is continuous. Lock gates, for example, need replacing on a 25-year (or shorter) cycle and need continuing repairs. Timber bridges rot and need new decks, and aqueducts leak and need re-lining. Safety and access must be balanced against the need to conserve unaltered historic structures that are likely to have statutory protection. Past repairs have often done more harm than good; hard cement-based mortars crudely applied to poorly-specified modern bricks are a legacy of the Cinderella years. In 2005/6 British Waterways spent £25.6 million on major infrastructure repairs inherited from the past. These statutory arrears are gradually being reduced but over £100 millon of works still remain to be done. With a reduced grant from Defra and with inflation costs in construction rising, the elimination of statutory arrears (many of which involve works to heritage assets of one kind or another) is a real operational challenge. Alongside the operational area of BritishWaterways’ work is the area of regeneration. British Waterways has been remarkably successful in promoting and partnering waterside development. Current estimates are that as much as £12 billion is being invested in waterside regeneration projects around the UK. One example is at Gloucester, where the River Severn joins the Gloucester and Sharpness Canal to form the inland port of Gloucester Docks. Here a £200 million mixed-use scheme covering 60 acres is taking shape and will transform the City of Gloucester over the next two decades. This would not be happening without the catalyst of the historic docks, but the idea that properly managed heritage assets add value to new development is embedded in British Waterways’ corporate psyche. In recent years BritishWaterways has raised standards of heritage management to a new level. Each of its nine waterway business units employs a full-time heritage manager and produces its own heritage action plan. Six business units also employ in-house heritage advisers. These people are key individuals who are determined to maintain high standards for heritage conservation. Left: Re-roofing the Grade II listed Clock Warehouse at Stourport Basins in 2006. This work has now been completed. Right: Blisworth Tunnel (Grand Union Canal), a Grade II listed building dating from 1805, has recently been repaired and is no longer a building at risk.
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