The improvement will allow easy access along the canal for the thousands of people who visit the waterways each year and include resurfacing worn out towpaths, installing easy access ramps for pushchairs and mobility users and upgrading signage along the canals. There will also be some repairs made to canal bank walls making it easier for boaters to moor along the many miles of canal in city centres.
Funding was secured through the Department for Transport's City Cycle Ambition Grant scheme. We supported funding bids submitted by Birmingham and West Yorkshire Metro and Transport for Great Manchester for improvements to cycle ways and towpaths.
The project is due to be completed by 2015 and will involve the towpath being improved along the:
- Birmingham & Fazeley Canal
- Grand Union Canal – Birmingham
- Worcester & Birmingham Canal
- Birmingham Main Line Canal
- Leeds & Liverpool Canal
- Ashton Canal
Tony Hales, chairman of the Canal & River Trust, said: “This is a tremendous outcome and I am delighted we have been successful in helping to secure this huge amount of money which will go directly into upgrading our canal towpaths, making them easily accessible for everyone to come and visit.
“The canals are used for a wider variety of uses today than at the height of the industrial revolution, with ever more people boating, walking and cycling along them. Towpaths provide wonderful green routes, linking busy towns and cities with the countryside, and this investment will improve them for everyone who enjoys them.”
