Leaving Aylesbury
It seems that due to the shortage of water we shall have only one opportunity in March and another in April to leave Aylesbury. On 24th March BW will let water down the Aylesbury arm so that boats may navigate up to the main line at Marsworth. Crossing the Tring summit will be negotiated on March 26 when boats have been assembled at either side.
A similar operation will take place a month later which is when we will set off.
Hi I went for a walk around Marsworth yesterday and the situation does not look good, there are sections of the canal which are dry and the Startops reservoir is extremely low. I hope you manage to set off for this year's travels on time. Michael Neale a friend of John from Britannia and Thomson.
ReplyDeleteMichael
ReplyDeleteThank you for your observations and good wishes.
BW has released further detailed info regarding the situation in the South East and I reproduce it here>
Jeff Whyatt, SE Waterways manger today outlined the restrictions that
inevitably will have to be in place over
the summer. Detailed information with precise times will be issued next week but
I thought a summary of the most likely outcome might be
helpful.
The level on the Tring summit will be kept as low as possible
- at least -250mm. Deep draughted boats will make test runs next week.
Lock openings will be restricted to 10.00 till 3.00pm
(in the SE region as a whole this measure has been estimated to save 2400Mls per annum)
Locks will be manned at Cowroast and Marsworth to ensure that
boats share locks. There will also be similar restrictions at 10 other sites in the SE.
There will be a 3 day window when the level on the Tring summit will be raised.
This is to enable local boating business to move boats
around. The dates for this will be announced on Tuesday.
BW is working on a system of Red, Amber and Green routes to
persuade boaters to avoid areas where there will definitely
be serious water shortages.
BW has agreed to do a limited amount of spot dredging on the
summit.
BW is aware that wide beams might have problems. Some sort of warning system will be devised.
The situation is monitored weekly and will be reviewed on 16th April.
On the Tring Summit all sources of water for 2012
(reservoirs, boreholes, feeders etc.) is 2500 Mls(2900 Mls in 2011)
Loss = 1770 Mls (2170 Mls in 2011
Lock usage = 730Mls
So although we are starting the season with lower capacity,
the losses from the summit have been considerably reduced by
lowering the level.
I'll post all the water usage and capacity figures for the
whole SE region as soon as I receive them next week.
Reservoir capacity is as follows: (NB 2011 figures in
brackets)
Braunston 65% (86%)
Leicester 40% (81%)
Saddington 49% (97%)
S.Oxford 68% (96%)
Tring 61% (90%)
The last time things were as bad as this was in 1901