Northern boaters sentenced to indefinite ‘lock-in’!

Boaters on many sections of the Leeds and Liverpool Canal have been told they will be confined indefinitely to the pound where they moor because locks will be padlocked from the 22nd of May. They are advised to move to somewhere with access to customer services, facilities and support. Locks 85 – 36 and 33 and 30 will be padlocked and ‘ashed up’. Many eastern Pennine locks will be closed 2 or 3 days each week. 

This is all to retain more water in these canals while reservoir stocks are dwindling. 
According to the Canal and River Trust (CRT) the closures are necessary to prevent water being lost through lock operations, so canal levels can be kept at a safe level ‘to protect increasingly limited water resources and to help preserve canal infrastructure and ecology’ until there is ‘heavy and prolonged rainfall’. Apart from moorers the closures will severely affect continuous cruisers and holiday boaters.

But it’s not just a Leeds and Liverpool Canal problem.
Sections of the Rochdale Canal and Huddersfield Narrow Canal are also currently closed due to water shortages and the Cheshire locks on the Trent and Mersey Canal between Middlewich and Stoke on Trent have been temporarily closed to allow water levels to improve. Although most southern reservoirs have more water those feeding the Southern Grand Union Canal are low and low levels on Braunston summit may result in restrictions on the Calcutt and Hillmorton lock flights. More closures are expected, see up to date information on the CRT Notices and Stoppages pages.

And it’s not just a waterways problem.
There are national concerns that 2025 will be another summer drought year, like 1976, 1995 and 2003 which had similar dry springs, and the Government National Drought Group is already meeting regularly to prepare for water rationing. It’s been reported that we are currently experiencing the driest three-month period in over 90 years. According to the Met Office the UK in April saw just over half the rainfall it would usually expect, but Northern England and Wales were exceptionally dry, a mere 25% of average rainfall in Northern England and just 23% in Wales.

And canal water shortages are not just the result of low rainfall.
Water shortages are the result of the lack of investment in the water supply system reducing capacity and resilience. Even if all the reservoirs were full that would not be enough to supply a dry summer because much of what they now contain is not water but two hundred years of mud! Draining them and digging out millions of tons of mud would be enormously expensive, and finding somewhere to put that mud, often contaminated, would be almost impossible. Additionally many canal reservoirs were sold to domestic water supply companies, especially after the Rochdale and Huddersfield Narrow canals were closed. Although the ‘Millennium Millions’ funded those canal reopenings there was no money for new water supplies. Restoration was often done by amateur labour as cheaply as possible, leaving shallow canals unable to store much water, and leaky inefficient locks allowing precious water to run away. British Waterways were given no new money to maintain the reopened canals. CRT’s current budget is not enough to maintain their 1500 plus locks in efficient working order.

Engineering and legislation work reduces the capacity of many canal reservoirs.
The April CRT Reservoir Monthly Report states that ‘Toddbrook Reservoir…. is still kept at -12m below Top Water Level following the spillway incident in summer 2019, and it will remain at this level until the multi-million project to construct a new spillway is completed.’ (2026) ‘Several of the reservoirs in the Leeds & Liverpool and Huddersfield Narrow Canal group are being held down for investigation or engineering works…’. These reservoirs in April were at the lowest levels since records began (1998), some already under 60% of capacity.

Rivers are also suffering from low rainfall.
According to the Chartered Institution of Water and Environmental Management ‘river flows are far below average for the time of year, with almost every river catchment in the UK well below normal.’ Sections of the River Trent currently have to be navigated with care, the Pocklington Beck which supplies the Pocklington Canal is extremely low due to the reduced rainfall restricting canal navigation. The Ripon Canal may have to be closed due to the low level of the feeder River Skell. Locks on the River Stort are being closed overnight. Of course rivers are an important water supply water for many other canals and canal reservoirs, for instance The Monmouthshire and Brecon Canal which could run dry if water levels fall in the River Usk.

And it’s not just water shortages making this a difficult year for many canal boaters
Engineering works are preventing through navigation along many waterways.
In the north the Bridgewater Canal embankment breach in January near Little Bollington will not be repaired until at least December 2026.
The Macclesfield Canal breach near Bosley is not due to be repaired until late June, preventing the canal being used as an alternative to the Bridgewater Canal.
Anderton Lift was closed in January due to engineering problems and investigations are ‘still in their early stages’, so the River Weaver can’t be used as an alternative to the Bridgewater Canal.
The Lancaster Canal has mulitple problems. The Ribble Link has been closed by repairs to the Tidal lock gate since last June, stopping travel between the Lancaster Canal and the rest of the canal system. The breach at the Hollowforth Aqueduct has split the canal in two since July last year with still no indication of a completion date. The Glasson branch is closed by water shortages.
Southern boaters aren’t spared either, the partial collapse of Tardebigge Top Lock last October on the Worcester and Birmingham Canal prevents through navigation along the canal until at least August. The repairs to Wilmcote Top Lock will prevent through navigation of the South Stratford Canal until late June.
The May edition of the CRT Boaters Update has a list of 17 waterways with current restrictions due to engineering works.

So you need to plan your 2025 cruising routes carefully and flexibly.
Subscribe to stoppage updates from CRT at https://canalrivertrust.org.uk/notices. Water shortages are likely to get worse before getting better, it will take ‘heavy and prolonged rainfall’ before reservoir stocks improve!

Information from CRT Reservoir Watch, and Notices and Stoppages Pages.