AMBITIOUS £89M PLAN FOR ULSTER’S CANAL SYSTEM

AN ambitious £89 million programme a rejuvenated canal system throughout Northern Ireland was presented to the Northern Ireland Assembly on Tuesday.

The Minister for Culture, Arts and Leisure Michael McGimpsey presented the feasibility study to the Assembly, which was discussed at the third North/South Ministerial Council sectoral meeting on inland waterways that took place in Enniskillen last week.

Waterways Ireland is one of the six North/South Implementation Bodies created by the Good Friday Agreement which was created to enhance co-operation between North and South in managing, maintaining and developing principally for recreational purposes the main inland waterways of the island.

The feasibility study carried out by ESB International and Ferguson McAlveen outlines a restoration proposal for an Ulster Canal that would restore the canal with six-metre-wide locks along a modified route, which would link into the River Blackwater at the Lough Neagh end and the River Finn at the Lough Erne end.

The construction works of the Ulster Canal is £89 million and is expected to take about seven years to complete.

Mr McGimpsey said: “Roughly half the canal is in Northern Ireland and the rest is in the Irish Republic, so the arrangement is for an almost fifty-fifty split in relation to finding the capital. There is good business potential in the recreation of the Ulster Canal system and I have no doubt that private finance can be attracted.”

The minister added that there are hidden benefits to the canal restoration: “Canals go through rural areas that suffer from low economic activity. The experience in the Irish Republic, on the mainland and in Europe is that this type of development in such areas greatly enhances local communities.”

Mr McGimpsey also said that Waterways Ireland was conducting a study into the Lagan Belfast navigation scheme: “If the River Lagan navigation system were completed, with navigation through Lough Neagh, it would connect Belfast, through the Ulster Canal, to the Shannon waterways. That is an exciting prospect, offering huge potential for tourism earnings.”

While three major projects on the Shannon navigation at Limerick, Ballinasloe and Boyle have been completed, work in Northern Ireland only runs to replacement of the lock gates at Movanagher on the Lower Bann navigation and the refurbishment of two public jetties at Devenish on Lough Erne.

The headquarters of Waterways Ireland will be in Enniskillen with 70 full-time jobs and 380 staff – 220 of which are currently employed.

(AMcE)