... And then two come along at once

To paraphrase the old joke - as we have reported before, we have been working hard on obtaining planning permissions for a number of sites, and then we heard of two successful grants in one day!  The local team in Swindon, with support from the central team, has been working very hard to obtain the planning permission for the new landing stage at the Waitrose store at Wichelstowe.  After a certain amount of to-ing and fro-ing on the final design details, we have the permission.  This will enable us to crack on with building the landing stage, which will be available for a good part of the summer trips.  We are hoping that this will raise the profile of our very successful boat team even higher.

As if that was not enough, on the same day we heard that we have received permission for all of our plans to rebuild the canal, locks, lengthsman’s cottage, workshop, lime kiln etc at Pewsham.

Well done all of those involved in the huge amount of work that has gone into preparing the applications, and seeing them through.

Of course, both successful applications come with conditions, but that is now something we have to expect, and it is a question of working our way through them.

A number of the team had a walk along the canal at Studley Grange where we now have the lease; it was very heartening to see the work which has already started there, and we understand that the remaining preliminary works will start next week.  We are hoping that we will have some good news about whether we need to move an electricity pylon out of the way; the SSE engineer and our contractors Land and Water Services are trying to find a way so that we do not, which would save us time and expense.  On a lovely spring day, it was easy to imagine what a beautiful stretch of canal we are going to make out of a landfill site.

Our appeal for matched funding to pay for the essential preliminary works remains open, and we would be grateful for any contribution you can make.

In the background we are working on what the organisation and structure of the canal trust should look like to meet the new challenges, and we hope to bring you news of that and of other developments concerning our leadership shortly.

Finally  a correction  to some of the dates shown in the last blog -The Inaugural Meeting of the then Wilts & Berks Canal Amenity Group was held in the Long Room of Swindon Arts Centre on 8th October 1977, and the first edition of Dragon Fly was issued in November 1977 under the Editorship of Pete Boyce then of St. Margaret’s Road in Swindon –thanks to Neil Rumbold for setting the record straight

Chris Coyle