--- In [email protected], David Cragg <dhsrcr...@...> wrote: > > Not long after BW 'improved the headroom in the Tunnel@ by actually dropping > the water level a couple of inches at the overflow weir to reduce water > ingress into the copper works I was talking to a boater by the tunnel. > Â > He was a civil engineer and, having heard what BW had paid for 'dropping the > level' had been studying the tunnel with the idea of raising it by the odd > foot to let all boats through. He saw no obvious problem and felt that his > firm could have raised the roof for half of what BW had spent on their > 'dropping the level'.
At the weekend I happened to bump into a couple of friends who were involved in the Destination Froghall project (which combined reopening of the first lock and basin of the Uttoxeter with dropping the level of the last pound of the Caldon to give a little more headroom through the tunnel), so I asked them about this. The response was that the lowering had cost BW relatively little. It was only a fairly small part of the overall project (which I think came in at something of the order of half a million or a bit more, most of which went on the basin and lock), and a large part of the project had been funded externally to BW anyway. However there had been a significant repair bill resulting from a section of channel having been dewatered for inspection prior to the work, during which it suffered somne kind of bank slips or collapses as a result of there not being the pressure of water to support it. Or were you talking about some earlier lowering of the water level? Martin L
