I know that February is a short month, but, really have all the 28 days of this
month come and gone? And yet, looking back over the length of this month an
awful lot of work has been carried out and tasks achieved.
The weather has been incredible for the time of the year. What a difference it
makes to us' oldies' and to the younger ones too. With good turnouts on
workdays, (which in effect are now most days of the week) rapid progress on all
bits along this length of the canal has been achieved.
Starting at the Fosseway Lane end of the site, the tranformation from an untidy
collection of earth mounds to a recognisable canal bed with a towpath along the
South side and a rudimentary nature trail footpath emerging on the North side is
amazing. With the heavy plant, on loan from Chasetown Civil Engineering, long
since returned, our lads have done a tremendous amount of work with our own
excavators and dumper trucks. Looking to the furure, when the corporate volunteers start appearing again, and they complete this heritage footpath all the
way from Falklands Road through to Fosseway Lane it will be some walk! The
only bit that may well still be in need of work will be that section from lock 18 to
Fosseway Lane, which is scheduled to be worked on by the Wergies later on in
the year.
Coming halfway back towards Falklands Road, you will find that we have been carrying out an exercise in the base of the deep pit. There are two facts we needed to establish. Firstly we needed to find out if the sand/ sandstone sub soil is sufficiently stable to allow a steep sided batter along sections of the canal along Falklands drive. From the Fosseway site along towards Claypit Lane the canal progressively gets deeper till it again emerges prior to the new locks before Birmingham Road. Initial studies suggest that there is indeed sufficient stability to enable a steepsided canal embankment. And secondly we wanted to find the water table. The excavators took a bit of a hammering in trying to get through this soft rock. Unfortunately our 5 tonne digger broke a major casting in the process. The machine was out of action for about two weeks awaiting a new part. Thanks to Steve Webster and his helpers it was soon fixed and is as good as new. To those who donated money to help pay for this repair through Facebook, many thanks, approximately 50 % was donated towards a very expensive repair.
Elsewhere on the site, work has continued without interruption. The base for the
towpath wall has now been completed as far as it goes towards Falklands Road.
A short section of 'Moody Blocks' have been positioned where the wall comes to
an end before it takes a sharp turn right along Falklands Road. Provision for an
escape ladder is being built in to this wall just by the 'Moody Blocks'. Another
escape ladder will be incorporated in the pound corner nearest to the railway
line.
Take a walk along to the new 'wetlands' area and you will find that the two mini
islands have now been completed. The central landing strip has yet to be done.
It looks really good.
Finally, the sandbag wall facing Falklands Road is making steady progress. It is intended to seed this embankment on completion. This wall consists of sandbags filled with a dry mix of sand and cement. Over time, just a few days, the mixture goes rock hard and you are left with a permanent structure. That's it folks. Don't forget folks, we need your support; verbally, physically and financially, to enable us to keep up the momentum. It's up to you !
Hugh Millington
