silver Propeller challenge

© Robin Higgs

Working party in Welshpool, October 1969

© Robin Higgs ‘Closed’ notice at Etruria Junction in June 1969

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Some of the 1,000+ volunteers on Ashtac in 1972

Opening ceremony at Bidford Bridge, July 1971, a stage on the way to full reopening of the Upper Avon in 1974

© Chris Clegg Moorings at Peterborough on the River Nene in 1973

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13 1971 - Welshpool

Bypass Enquiry

The separate lengths of canal owned by the Shropshire Union Canal Company between Welsh Frankton and Newtown (later known as the Montgomery Canal) were closed in 1944. Shropshire Union Canal Society, formed in 1966, produced a proposal in 1969 for restoration. An immediate problem was a proposed bypass at Welshpool along the line of the canal. A Welshpool Bypass Action Committee was formed to defeat the proposal, and they encouraged IWA and SUCS to organise a large working party in the town in October 1969 to demonstrate support. At a Public Enquiry held in July 1971, the Society and IWA presented the case for retaining the canal. The proposal for the bypass route along the canal was rejected by the Secretary of State for Wales in 1972, paving the way for restoration through the town and from the Welsh Frankton end (where the locks reopened in 1987).

14 1972 - Ashtac

The restoration of the Ashton Canal, agreed to in 1971, was started in March 1972 with Ashtac, another mass work party. Restoration continued over the next two years and the canal was reopened in May 1974. As far back as 1961, Robert Aickman had regarded the Ashton Canal as a bellweather for the canal system as a whole, arguing that if the campaign to restore the Ashton was lost then IWA’s fight to protect the whole network would have been effectively lost too. Unlike Operation Ashton, Ashtac was a collaborative event, reflecting the change in the political atmosphere on the waterways.

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1974 - Reopening of the Upper Avon

Discussions about restoring the Avon between Evesham and Stratford had started within IWA in 1963, and in 1965 the Upper Avon Navigation Trust was formed to carry out the task. The upper section of the river had been abandoned as a navigation for over 100 years, and the locks had become completely derelict. Robert Aickman was actively involved in the Upper Avon in his role as chairman of the Trust, despite no longer being a part of IWA. It took five years of negotiating by the navigation manager, David Hutchings, with landowners and the Severn River Authority, who were responsible for drainage. Dredging and construction of new locks and weirs took a similar amount of time using a small full-time staff, volunteers, Army personnel and prisoners from Gloucester Prison. Funding came from an anonymous donor, IWA’s national restoration fund, public appeals, and central government. The river was reopened on 1 June 1974 by Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother; David Hutchings was subsequently awarded an MBE.

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1974 - Reopening of the Caldon Canal

IWA members had managed to navigate the full length of the canal in 1960, but in 1961 a notice appeared at Etruria stating that the canal was ‘closed’ beyond Hazlehurst Junction. Attempts to improve the condition of the canal had been made by the Inland Waterways Protection Society and Stoke-onTrent Boat Club, along with IWA’s 1960 National Rally in Stoke aiming to draw attention to it. The Caldon Canal Society was formed from an attempt to get the National Trust to become involved. However, it was Staffordshire County Council’s financial commitment in 1969 that finally allowed restoration to start in 1972, with the Caldon Canal Society providing voluntary assistance to British Waterways. The canal reopened in September 1974.

17 1977 - Anglian

Water Act

Another parliamentary battle in which IWA played a leading role was a private Act promoted by the then Anglian Water Authority, which eventually became the 1977 Anglian Water Act. IWA brokered several agreements from petitioners to improve the Bill for navigation interests during its passage through Parliament, including revised bylaws for mooring.

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1978 - Reopening of the River Great Ouse

At the start of the Second World War the Great Ouse was navigable up to Tempsford, improvement works having been made by the Great Ouse Catchment Board but with no further work proposed after the war. The Bedford Boat Club was set up in 1950 to campaign for completion of works up to Bedford, a cause taken on by the Great Ouse Restoration Society when it was formed by Robert Aickman, Peter Scott and others in 1951. The first success was the opening of Bedford Lock in 1954. By 1960, restoration had largely faltered but was rejuvenated by Alan Faulkner, Teddy Edwards and the East Anglian Waterways Association. Navigation works were gradually completed along with land drainage works, partly owing to the IWA 1973 National Rally at Ely, which promoted restoration of the top end of the river. The upper river was fully reopened to Bedford with the rebuilding of Castle Mills lock in 1978.