16/3/2004

The historic Monmouthshire & Brecon and Montgomery Canals are to get a new lease of life that will help boost the area's sustainable tourism potential, Wales' Economic Development and Transport Minister Andrew Davies announced today (Tuesday, 16 March).

The project to restore, redevelop and enhance the canals has received £1.1m from the European Interreg IIIB North West Europe programme.

Alongside the funding, the Minister also announced the formation of a Welsh Assembly Government-hosted working group to take forward waterway development and restoration projects in Wales.

When these canals were originally developed in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries they were used as a way to transport goods such as coal, iron ore, limestone and agricultural produce. In recent years, tourism and recreation has grown through pleasure boat activity and angling on the water and walking and cycling on the banks.

The funds will enable a dry section of the Montgomery Canal to be restored using channel designs that will minimise their impact on the natural environment. At the same time, the ecological corridor provided by the canal will be extended by working with land owners.

On the Monmouthshire & Brecon Canal, a section of the canal will be restored, and a mooring basin built within a new residential development at South Sebastopol, near Pontypool. The project will also look at methods for eradicating invasive plant species and develop educational material to promote the canal and its restoration to schoolchildren.

Source:	National Assembly for Wales
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