Scottish Canals Update
Argyll and Bute Council · 1 May 2024
Back to Mid Argyll, Kintyre and the Islands Area Community Planning Group — 1 May 2024 and its agenda
Text extracted from the council's PDF. Layout and reading order may differ from the original.
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Crinan Canal planned winter works programme 2023/24 and dummy lock reactive works – update We’re delighted to have reached another milestone in these winter works, rewatering Crinan Basin, the dummy lock, and the sea lock! Our teams are busy with the final pieces of work and site take-down, and we are now on schedule to reopen the canal on Monday 29th April, a day earlier than anticipated. We also look forward to welcoming you to our community meeting this week – please note that this has moved from today to tomorrow; the meeting will now be on Thursday 25th April, at 6.30pm in the Egg Shed, Ardrishaig. What have we been doing? At lock 15, the Crinan sea lock, we completed the last of the mechanical and electrical works before removing the scaffolding from the lock chamber. We also removed the temporary dam upstream of the lock and completed the repointing work on the back wall in Crinan Basin, below the car park. Next, we began dry commissioning the new lock gates and completed snagging works, before preparing to rewater the basin and the locks. Rewatering was completed last week – this was a faster process than last year, as we just had to raise the water level between locks 13 and 14 by around 1m, before filling the basin, dummy lock, and sea lock. We were then able to use the 130-tonne crane on the over-lock platform to remove the stop planks downstream of the sea lock. The Crinan Canal operations team transported these via pontoon along the canal to lock 10, where a smaller crane lifted them out. Next, we moved the 130-tonne crane on to the road at Crinan and used it to take apart and remove the crane platform – this was also transported via the canal to lock 10, with the assistance of the canal operations team. We then began our reinstatement works around the basin, including completing the installation of new electrical bollards and removing the temporary pedestrian bridge over lock 14. Access has now reverted to over the lock 14 gates. What are we doing now? Now that the canal is rewatered, we’re carrying out wet commissioning of the new lock gates. The team are also progressing with the site take-down; work requiring the 130-tonne crane finished yesterday, and our temporary road closure alongside the Crinan Basin has now been lifted.
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This week, all construction equipment held at the lock 10 car park will be transported to Ardrishaig, and our site cabins in the Crinan Basin car park are scheduled to be removed. Therefore, please be aware that the road to and from Crinan will be busier this week with heavy vehicles. In addition to works at the sea lock, we also have a team working at locks 12 and 13 at Dunardy, installing the stone quadrants that are used in operation with the balance beams. These works should be finished towards the end of next week, and don’t affect the reopening of the canal. What will we be doing next? We will continue the site take-down and continue with reinstatement and landscaping works around the basin. The safety fencing around the dummy lock will remain, so there will be no public access over the dummy lock. Crinan dummy lock – reactive works We are carrying out a phased programme of works to repair a leak at the Crinan dummy lock, which was the original sea lock until the 1930s. These works are subject to regulatory consent, and thanks to our teams and our partners at Historic Environment Scotland, we have been able to carry out the first phase of the repair in tandem with the sea lock gate replacement winter works. This first phase of work involved driving sheet piling down into the base of the lock chamber, in front of the old downstream gates. We then created a berm, or embankment, of stones on the canal-side of the piling to ensure strength and stability, before pouring a high-strength concrete between the piles and the old downstream gates. Finally, the piles were cut to size. While the first phase of repair works at the dummy lock are complete, there will be return works for the second phase, therefore some of the reinstated surfaces around the sea lock and dummy lock are temporary, not the finished surface. The second phase of works is not anticipated to require a canal closure, and we’ll share more information about this as plans and regulatory permissions progress. Electricity bollard upgrade works at Bellanoch Marina The new electrical bollards at Bellanoch have been installed and are now in operation. Reopening of Crinan Basin car park, lock 10 car park, and the road beside Crinan Basin The car park at lock 10 will be open from this Friday, 26th April, and we hope to reopen the Crinan Basin car park and the lay by alongside Crinan Basin from this Saturday, 27th April. As we’ve mentioned previously, we will place temporary traffic barriers along the section of wall that we removed in the lay by. We will fully reinstate this wall once we have completed the second phase of works at the dummy lock. The temporary road closure alongside Crinan Basin has now finished – this was the final road closure for these winter works. We will provide an update on the reopening of the car parks on our Ongoing Works page on the Scottish Canals website and on the Crinan Canal Facebook page. Keep up to date We remain committed to keeping local residents, businesses and other stakeholders informed of the winter works programme, and continue to do so via:
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Email updates We circulate email updates regularly throughout the works programme; if you would like to receive these updates, please email CrinanWinterWorks@scottishcanals.co.uk. Your details will not be held for any other purpose and will not be passed on to any third parties. Anyone already signed up to receive Crinan winter works updates will continue to do so unless you advise us otherwise. Community meetings We will continue to hold our quarterly community forum meetings; the next meeting will be Thursday 25th April, at 6.30pm in the Egg Shed, Ardrishaig. Online updates We continue to share updates on the Scottish Canals website. You can find more general information and updates about the works online on our Projects page at bit.ly/CrinanWinterWorks23-24. We’ll share notice of specific road closures, towpath closures, and diversions, on our Ongoing Works page at bit.ly/OngoingWorks_CrinanWinterWorks23-24. We will also share updates on the Crinan Canal Facebook page and the Scottish Canals’ Facebook page. If you have any concerns during this programme of works, you can the local Scottish Canals office on 01546 603210 (09:00 – 17:00, Mon – Fri) or you can email CrinanWinterWorks@scottishcanals.co.uk Alternatively, you can contact Mackenzie Construction on 0141 633 5555 (08:00 – 17:00, Mon - Fri). Yours sincerely, Laurie Piper Head of Customer Experience Scottish Canals