ANGLIAN CUTTINGS IPSWICH BRANCH NEWSLETTER
NO. 133 JUNE 2016
IWA Ipswich Branch Committee
YOUR COMMITTEE Chairman Rod Mansel chairman.ipswichbranch@waterways.org.uk 07951 682048 Secretary Carole Green secretary.ipswichbranch@waterways.org.uk Treasurer Spencer Greystrong treasurer.ipswichbranch@waterways.org.uk 07597 862793 Membership Dale Green membership.ipswichbranch@waterways.org.uk 07850 960635 River Gipping Trust Gerry Crease RGTrep.ipswichbranch@waterways.org.uk 07747 840982
Welcome to the latest edition of the IWA Ipswich Branch newsletter. This edition is shorter than previous editions due to the lack of a Newsletter Editor so if anyone is feeling creative and would like to take on the role, please let anyone on the committee know. The cover photograph shows Etruria Lock on the Trent and Mersey taken during our coach trip this year. There are still a number of vacant positions on the committee and the committee would welcome any volunteers and offers of help to fill them. These are Minute Secretary, Social Secretary, Broads Forum Representative and Newsletter/Anglian Cuttings Editor. If you think that you can help in any of these areas, please contact the Chairman or Secretary.
CHAIRMAN’S CORNER Welcome to Anglian Cuttings. The Branch is staying afloat and trying to keep on top of the many and varied activities throughout the region, from keeping an eye on the Broads Authority Draft Local Plan to Ipswich Borough Council’s plans for the Sugar Beet Factory site. In between we try to put on a varied social programme, some reports of which can be found in this issue. We were fortunate to have an IWA Trustee attend our last committee meeting to give us some background to the changes to the Articles of Association. This Anglian Cuttings contains articles on the Ipswich Branch Coach Trip to Trentham Gardens, Churnet Valley Railway and the National Memorial Arboretum and the Branch Annual Dinner.
DATES for your DIARY 10th September 2016 Walk along the River Gipping Path 14th October 2016 Talk – The Stowmarket Gun Cotton Explosion 11th November 2016 Fish & Chip Supper 2nd December 2016 Quiz night Questions by Gerry Crease 10th February 2017 Annual General Meeting 25th March 2017 IWA Annual Dinner All events except the walk and Annual Dinner will be held in the Needham Market Community Centre at 7.30 pm The Committee will be considering possible future events and details will be advised in due course and will be posted on the website. If members have any suggestions or are happy to assist in the arrangements, please contact the Secretary.
RESTORATION River Gipping Trust The River Gipping Trust has now acquired a pre-owned three tonne dumper truck which is being used in conjunction with the mini digger at Pipps Ford to great effect. The old weir has been renovated and a new earth bridge built to provide a safer passage way along the footpath. The photograph shows the bridge formed using a concrete pipe recycled from the bywash. and create more mud to be moved around. The RGT have also been busy training more volunteers to use the new dumper truck in preparation for more work on the bywash at Pipps Ford. As always, volunteers are welcome every Wednesday, and most second Saturdays of every month.
WORKING PARTY DATES Working Parties are held by the River Gipping Trust from 0900 to 1700 every Wednesday and on the second Saturday of each month. For further information and to confirm dates contact Martin Bird Tel: 01394 380765 Email: restoration@rivergippingtrust.org.uk
IWA Ipswich Branch – Weekend Away 14-15th May 2016 Yet another very enjoyable weekend for 36 people from our Branch and another two from the Ipswich Maritime Trust. The weekend started for Paul our driver at 4.00am when he left home to collect our coach and give it a full checkover before making his first pickup from Ambrose Avenue at 7.00am. By 7.45am following our stop at Copdock we were still two people short. Pete took a train to Stoke (his car broke down on the way) and Rod met us at Elmswell. We then headed to our first refreshment stop at 9.00 (needed to comply with the law dealing with driver’s hours). To try something different I had made arrangements with Frost’s Garden Centre in Huntingdon to offer tea, coffee and a full English should anyone want one! I can recommend this stop to anyone travelling North. Turn off the A14 at the Brampton turning. We hit the road again at 9.45, arriving at the Trentham Estate around mid-
day. As we pulled into the car park it was pretty obvious that Trentham is an
extremely popular place to go! We had visions of the place being packed out but nothing could be further from the truth. The Trentham Estate covers 725 acres and includes the award-winning Trentham Gardens, Shopping Village, Garden Centre, Monkey Forest and Aerial Extreme. The gardens won BBC’s Countryfile Garden of the Year 2015 award. There is more than enough room for everyone. You can see some more pictures of the Estate on our web page. We left the Estate at 5.30 and soon arrived at our hotel. Some of you may remember the government sponsored National Garden Festivals in the 1980’s. Stoke on Trent hosted the second one in 1986 which was based around the original Josiah Wedgewood factory at Etruria and the Trent & Mersey Canal. Our hotel was near the canal and Wedgewood’s original home at Etruria has been incorporated into the hotel leisure centre.
The hotel was extremely busy with 3 coaches and a wedding but the staff coped admirably with the numbers. A few of us took advantage of the hotel swimming pool but unfortunately it closes at 8.00pm at weekends. I’m sorry to say that one of our party suffered a fall in the hotel and ended up in hospital with a broken leg but she is now recovering well and has arrived back at home. On Sunday our first point of call was the Churnet Valley Railway. We were due to pick up our train at Cheddleton but with a narrow bridge and 7.5 tonne weight limit on one side and a low bridge on the other, Paul had to drop us off at the top of the road, reverse and drive of to Froghall to meet us
at the far end. His son, Nathan, clearly has no confidence in his dad’s driving as he was convinced his dad was about to hit various walls and vehicles. He didn’t, by the way.
The railway runs through an area known locally as ‘Little Switzerland’ and it was easy to see why this should be. It’s one of the most scenic preserved railways that I’ve ever travelled. The railway has a very refreshing attitude to its visitors. We were allowed to wander at will around the workshops and nobody tried to tell us how dangerous it was! We boarded the 11.15 train to Froghall where I had arranged for our group to have tea and buns in the refreshment room. It was noticeable that one or two of our party managed to get a very large scone with lashings of jam and cream to go with their cup of tea! We left the railway around 12.45 for our journey to the National Memorial Arboretum arriving around 1.45. I had arranged for an introductory talk in the Chapel by one of the many volunteers followed by a trip round the memorial gardens on the road train. He explained to us how The idea for the
Arboretum was conceived by David Childs in 1988. David believed that it would form a living tribute to service men and women for future generations to reflect upon and enjoy. The Arboretum was officially opened on 16 May 2001.It is part of the Royal British Legion group of charities. It covers 140 acres and has over 50,000 trees.
Although the majority of memorials are dedicated to members of the services there are many that commemorate civilian organisations such as the Boys Brigade, the RNLI and SANDS (Stillbirth and NeoNatal Death Society). After our guided tour of the arboretum on the road train we adjourned to the restaurant for afternoon tea – and what a tea it was! Sandwiches, cakes, fruit, scones, jam and cream all served on 3 tier cake stands and accompanied by tea and coffee. Some people weren’t able to finish so plastic ‘doggie’ bags were produced by the staff.
We left the arboretum at 4.30pm with a stop at Cambridge Services for Paul’s compulsory 45-minute break. Our final stop was my house around 8.30pm.
Reports from our group suggest that a good time was had by all and where are we going next year? Watch this space.
Message from an IWA Trustee We were lucky enough to have Paul Strudwick who is an IWA Trustee and also Chairman of London Branch of the IWA attend our last committee meeting and he wrote the following: Let me introduce myself. I am Paul Strudwick one of your trustees and chairman of the London Region. So you may ask am I writing an article for the Ipswich Branch magazine. As you may be aware Eastern Region has not had a Region Chairman for some time so when I had the opportunity to meet your committee recently I agreed to write something from “Head Office” perspective about the work of IWA nationally.
I thought you might be interested in some of the work of the National Navigation Committee, sometime referred to as Navcom, and the campaigning they do on your behalf. Looking at a typical meeting the committee deals with a huge range of subjects from Carbon Monoxide dangers in boats to the Department for Transport’s Cycling and Walking Investment Strategy consultation and our policy on Waterborne Freight. Perhaps the most important campaign we have run since that which resulted in the formation of Canal and River Trust (C&RT) is to have the Environment Agency (EA) Navigations transferred to them. When I have been out and about some people have questioned the need for this campaign as, at present, there is little sign of a problem except for a back log of dredging. They also point out that the EA staff are doing a very good job keeping their navigations working. These are very good points with which I agree totally. But under the surface all is not well. There are disturbing reports that on the Thames it is impossible to get a boat over 60 foot beyond Oxford due to siltation on bends. In East Anglia all work has stopped on the Fenland link. In my opinion we have been lucky so far, when there is a major failure, such as a lock, EA will struggle to find the money to carry out repairs. This will result in
a protracted closure or even an attempt to abandon the navigation. Our campaign is proactive, trying to prevent the worst happening, and it will be a good foundation when we have to react to a major crisis sometime in the not too distant future. Another campaign we have been running is to look at the condition of winding points across the canal network. We have produced a “standard� design for a winding hole to be used by restoration groups or where new ones are needed. We have also carried out a survey of the condition of winding points across the country. In London, I recently met C&RT to discuss the situation in the area. We quickly established that there was not a definitive list of official winding points for the London Region. IWA and C&RT sat down together to produce a list of winding points for the area. We used a number of sources and where three or four of them agreed there was a winding point it was added to the list. Secondly where two sources agreed and IWA and C&RT felt a turning point would be useful at that point it was added and finally where there were several turning points in a short pound or close together on a longer pound we chose the best/safest one to be the official Winding Point. We hope to be able to publish this list in the near future so that both organisations can monitor the condition and ensure that these winding points remain available in the future. Across the country branches have been asked to carry out similar reviews with C&RT and, where appropriate, other navigation authorities. If you would like to know more about national campaigns of think you would like to get more involved, please get in touch. Paul Strudwick Chair Person London Region Twitter Paul@greenboater
Ipswich Branch Annual Dinner The Branch Annual Dinner organised by Gerry Crease and Patti his wife was held at the Cedars Hotel Stowmarket on the 5th March 2016. We were treated to a lovely meal which everyone enjoyed and our thanks go to Gerry and Patti for their faultless organisation. At the end of the meal the Chairman’s Award was presented to Chard Wadley in recognition of his many years’ service to the Ipswich Branch in various roles but mainly as Chairman. Unfortunately, the photographs of the presentation were eaten by gremlins, so the photograph below was taken at Froghall Station during the coach trip!
The current Chairman Rod Mansel presenting the Chairman’s Award to Chard Wadley. IWA Waterways Triathlon I have been asked to publicise this event. The flyer can be found below.
IWA Waterways Restoration Raffle In August, IWA will launch the third Waterways Restoration Raffle. You will find a book of raffle tickets enclosed with the Autumn edition of Waterways Magazine. Last years raffle was won by an Ipswich Branch member so I hope you will support the raffle again this year. The money raised will go towards restoration efforts across the system. You can also nominate a specific restoration project on each ticket you buy. For example you could ask for some of the proceeds of the raffle to go to the River Gipping Trust or perhaps the North Walsham & Dilham Canal Trust. The more nominations a particular project receives the greater the proportion of profits that will go to that project.
USEFUL WEBSITES IWA Head Office - http://www.waterways.org.uk Waterway Recovery Group - http://www.wrg.org.uk River Gipping Trust - http://rivergippingtrust.org.uk River Stour Trust - http://www.riverstourtrust.org East Anglian Waterways Association –http://www.eawa.co.uk Aylsham Navigation - http://aylsham-navigation.norfolkparishes.gov.uk River Waveney Association -http://groupspaces.com/RiverWaveneyTrust pages/our-aims IWA Peterborough Branch - http://www.iwapeterborough.org.uk The Broads Society - http://www.broads-society.org.uk The Australian Canal Society - http://www.auscanal.org.au/ The Canal & River Trust - http://canalrivertrust.org.uk/ DEFRA Dept. for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs http://www.defra.gov.uk
The Inland Waterways Association is a non-profit distribution company limited by guarantee. Registered Office; Island House, Moor Road, Chesham, Buckinghamshire. HP5 1WA Tel: 01494 783453 Web: www.waterways.org.uk Registered in England No. 612245. Registered as a Charity No. 212342