A Journey through the Heart of Wiltshire without getting your feet wet: the Kennet and Avon Canal By Rebecca Davies Bsc. (Hons).
A Kennet and Avon Canal Journey
Introduction
Wiltshire is the finest county, with a great many things to see and do, and good access to London and Bristol. If, like me you’re interested in the past, there is, what appears to be, an endless supply of antiquities to study. Such as the Alton Barnes white horse that you see in the image below.
But! One big snag in Wiltshire life – no coastline. Nor are there are many navigable rivers or lakes in the county. And so few opportunities for boats.
The spring at Limpley Stoke
So…we need to dig a canal…
In around 1373 the Dutch invented the pound lock. That being a simple system for getting boats over different water levels, on a river, below the weir to above the weir, and on a canal allowing it to cross over a hill rather than having to go around it.
This is, of course, a Eurocentric version of the story; the Chinese had pound locks on their canal as early as 984 AD.
Description
The Kennet and Avon (K&A) canal is in many ways a typical English waterway. It opened in the late 18th century, enjoyed profitable use until the coming of the railway. And then suffered a slow decline until closure. Now, in recent decades, it’s re-watered as a tourist attraction.
John Rennie, in 1794-181, built this canal. The canalised part is 57 miles (93km) long. including the canalised sections of the Kennet and Bristol Avon it is 87 miles (140km) in total. There are 105 locks and the last barge through came through in 1948.
The Kennet & Avon Canal Trust was one of the first organisations to fight for the preservation and restoration of the canal system for the benefit of the leisure industry. This idea took a while to absorb, given the negative vision of canals as nasty stagnant places full of rubbish winding without purpose through drab urban slums.
The K&A canal opened fully once more in 1991.
Wiltshire Features – Travelling from Avoncliff to Little Bedwyn
Caen Hill Locks (Lock numbers 22-50) – How do you get a barge up a hill? With a great deal of patience and one of England’s longest flights of locks.
It takes 5-6 hours to navigate by boat, though people say that a Newbury trader, J. T. Ferris, worked up the flight in 2.5 hours. This was the last part of the canal to see completion with the locks opened in 1810.
Caen Hill locks
K&A Canal Museum. The museum of the K&A is at Devizes, run by the K&A Trust. This is the location of their headquarters and the shop. They do cruises in the summer months.
Honey Street Wharf – Roughly the half way point of the canal, Honey Street wharf was the main boatbuilding yard on the K&A. It’s known for its famous pub, The Barge.
Gates to Honey Street Wharf
Wilcot Wide Water– Environmental concerns amid industrial envelopment are not new things. Lady Wroughton, unlike some landowners, was not against the idea of a canal. But she cannily insisted it should be in the form of an ornamental lake. `Wilcot Wide Water`. The bridge at the end is especially decorative.
Wilcot Wide Water
Lady Bridge
The Bruce Tunnel – Thomas Brudenell-Bruce did not like the idea of a canal cutting upon his land, so a tunnel, (502 yards 459m) got built instead. Since there were no towpaths, the unpowered boats became drawn along by a chain.
Crofton pumping station
Crofton Pumping Station – This is the summit pound of the canal meaning that everywhere else is downhill – or stream. Using locks loses water and so needs topping up. This happens via a reservoir (as we see at Coate Water, near Swindon). Or pumped up from lower levels. There are both methods used at Crofton.
The `Number One` 1812 Boulton and Watt engine is the world’s oldest steam engine still in its original location. And it’s still able to do the job it first was fitted for. It’s accompanied by the `Number Two` engine, built by Harveys of Hayle, in 1846. This is the high point of the canal in more than mere altitude.
Crofton pumping station
In conclusion
Water Adds Value` the Canal and River trust tell us. A canal is a haven for wildlife which one might otherwise not find in the dry county of Wiltshire. It\s a place for industrial archaeology, a throughway for the waterway traveller, and a dwelling place for boat people,. And lastly it is part of flood prevention systems.
The Kennet and Avon is one of England’s most beautiful canals, being free of dowdy industrial or urban stretches. Yet, due to the significant number of locks, (105) it is more for the dedicated boat traveller rather than the cruising holidaymaker. Though you can hire holiday boats!
And, incidentally, you can enjoy the canal on foot or by bicycle as well as by boat.
PERFORMING ARTS COMPANY OFFERS SUMMER FUN FOR ALL CHILDREN – INCLUDING THOSE ON LOW INCOME
RPA arts fun for ALL The team at Revolution Performing Arts have joined the national HAF initiative. It’s backed by England footballer Marcus Rashford MBE.
This Holiday Activities & Food project, supported by government funding, is encouraging organisations across the UK to offer free places to children on low income. Families who wouldn’t be able to attend summer camps and sessions if their families had to pay.
Often these families have no spare income and cannot send their children to ‘summer schools’. Sometimes they cannot even afford to feed them. Eligible organisations offering places must commit to provide each child with a delicious meal every day. The places are for any child who receives free school meals.
Commercial, PR portrait of Fiona Da Silva-Adams owner of Revolution Performing Arts based in Swindon, Wiltshire. Images taken by Barbara Leatham Photography on July 22nd 2020.
HAF places in the borough and beyond
RPA founder Fi Da Silva Adams, signed up for the project via Swindon Council. She’ll offer HAF places in all RPA’s summer activities in Swindon, Wroughton and Shrivenham.
‘Our ethos at RPA is one of inclusivity. Poverty/low income shouldn’t exclude anyone from something they enjoy. I know what that feels like. I was one of those children who had free school meals and who had to take my ‘token’ and hand it over to get food. Because of that I know what that sense of exclusion and disadvantage feels like.
These places mean that those children who wouldn’t have been able to join us before due to lack of funds now can.
Summer fun sessions
RPA is staging summer fun sessions for children aged four to 11 years. The sessions will offer them opportunities to dance, sing and act across Swindon, Wiltshire, Gloucestershire and Oxfordshire. The HAF places are available for children who live in the Swindon Council area who are currently receiving free school meals.
The HAF project runs from July 26 to August 31 across the UK. It relates to activities provided by registered organisations recognised by their local authorities as offering credible summer activities for children from four years up to age 18. RPA’s activities are available for children aged four to 11.
‘Children have lost so much over the last year,’ Fi said. ‘Children need to meet and they need to have fun. We’ve designed every session with care to include green spaces so we can enjoy activities indoors and outdoors in safety.’
RPA will run sessions in singing, dancing, acting, song writing, theatre, arts & crafts, den building, outdoor water fun and more.
The sessions begin on July 26 to August 27 at four venues:
1. Lower Shaw Farm, West Swindon 2. Pineholt Village Centre, Hucclecotte, Gloucester 3. Legge House, Wroughton 4. Shrivenham Memorial Hall
Any parent who wishes to apply for a HAF placement for their child at the Swindon, Wroughton or Shrivenham venues can do it by applying via this link: www.swindon.gov.uk/HAF
Fi founded Revolution Performing Arts in 2007. Thee team have been running online sessions throughout all lockdowns. All RPA teachers are DBS checked, trained in first aid and receive training in safeguarding protocols.
RPA specialises in empowering young people to celebrate their individuality through the power of performing arts. For more information visit https://revolutionpa.co.uk
Quite how one might have a city in possession of an art collection of national importance yet nowhere to see it is a mystery to me. But then so much of what SBC does is a mystery to me. This is the unfunniest of jokes.
As a good friend said:
‘8 Years of limiting access to the collection except via outreach projects seems inadequate & reputationally damaging for a growing town seeking city status. I am reminded of the importance of the arts to so many throughout the ages, including Prime Minister Winston Churchill & his statement of the importance of investing in the arts for the good of the nation.His sister repeatedly stated the importance of the arts for his wellbeing too, especially in helping him to deal with the ‘ black dog ‘ of depression and how painting & access to the arts enabled him to ‘ keep going‘ when times were tougher than ever.’
The CMDB
The Cabinet Member Decision Notice from 29th June 2021 does not make for an edifying read. So much is wrong with this whole thing I don’t where to start. Luckily for me, I don’t have to. Here’s some initial thoughts on the matter from one of the Friends of the museum and art gallery on the matter and I’m repeating them here. Edited only for the purposes of all the SEO stuff.
Aspley House
Extracts from the cultural quarter prospectus
Here’s some extracts from Swindon’s cultural quarter investment prospectus.
‘The town’s Art Collection is a superb, international quality celebration of painting and studio ceramics. Much of it among the very best work of British artists at work in the mid-twentieth century. The collection is loved and cherished but deserves for more people to see it. And for the collection to be form a visitor destination in its own right.
To achieve this, the cultural quarter will feature a new and dramatic pavilion at the heart of the new public park in the Kimmerfields development. A permanent home for the display of the collection and its appreciation through permanent and changing displays of art and ceramics. All in a landmark ‘jewel-box’ of a building. And that set in a public realm that will itself be a place for public art and for outdoor and informal performance’.
‘The town’s museum collections tell important stories about how Swindon came to be. And about the lives of its communities down the centuries. For new communities, and for young people growing up in Swindon, the museum collection is important in defining what it means to be a ‘Swindonian.’
AND THIS PROPOSAL WILL DENY A WHOLE GENERATION OF SWINDON’S YOUNG THAT VERY THING.
To ensure the widest possible access to, and enjoyment of these collections and stories, the quarter will extend to an imaginative project to consider their redisplay at the Town Hall. From which Swindon Dance will move to the new Dance Centre, linked with the town’s Central Library, at the Regent Circus southern end of the quarter’
Page 59 – The route to realisation and Page 60 Organising the delivery plan
‘This programme is indicative at this stage’
Timeline for new Art Gallery at Kimmerfields
If the Museum is going to move to the old Town Hall, following building of the new dance centre, these indicative timelines would apply:
So no museum and art gallery for around a decade?! Assuming that the cultural quarter (God I loathe that term – everything’s a quarter. Shudder) ever happens.
As much as it might be a nice thing I suspect it’s about as real as fairies at the bottom of the garden and the lost city of Atlantis. Not that I’m cynical.
Just … NO! This is simply absurd! It’s a disaster – in no small part because the museum and it’s contents feature in Secret Swindon and Swindon in 50 Buildings!
Thoughts on the closure of Apsley House
Many points to ponder and ask here!
1. How can Swindon apply for city status when it’s considering shutting down the Museum and Art Gallery for several years?
2. Are there covenants on the collections, which mean that they have to be made available for the residents of Swindon?
3. If Apsley House must remain closed then then the council must find a new permanent location. At once and within Swindon Town Centre for the display of parts of the SMAG Collections until the new facilities are opened.
4. The proposals for the new cultural quarter should include detailed arrangements for the storage, care and security of all the SMAG collections. All with an undertaking that no items are disposed of in any way.
5. The proposals for the new cultural quarter should include provision for specifically dedicated staff to be in charge of the SMAG collections throughout the whole of the transition period.
Apsley House and adjoining Gallery extension
How did SBC acquire the house?
Are there any covenants on its use?
If Apsley House is sold is there any way of ensuring that the proceeds go towards maintaining the SMAG collections?
Have SBC submitted an expression of interest in the Museum Estate and Development Fund? Through that grants of £50k to £5m are available? If not – why not?
A package
The house and Gallery extension might be difficult to sell together. Apsley House has Grade II listing.
The upper floors of Apsley House are not accessible at present for all visitors because of the short stair flights. But the ground floor rooms are accessible. And the Gallery is accessible via the existing lift. Is there any room for the addition of toilets on the ground floor or at the gallery level?
Is it possible to keep the gallery as a separate building with provision of accessible toilet and staff accommodation?
And below a link to further comments from Cllr Jane Milner Barry
If people are so moved here are some useful email addreses:
Robert Buckland: robert.buckland.mp@parliament.uk Cllr Renard: DRenard@swindon.gov.uk SBC CEO: ceoffice@swindon.gov.uk Editor of the Swindon Advertiser: pete.gavan@wiltshire.newsquest.co.uk
Important Development for Save Oasis Swindon Campaign
Important Development for SOS Campaign This week, the SOS campaign saw an important development.
Right out of the blue Damien Siviter, part of SevenCapital’s executive team contacted the campaign, requesting a meeting. Thus, on Wednesday of this week, two campaign representatives, Tony Hillier and Neil Robinson headed to the Park Lane, London offices of the development company.
The ultimate upshot of a fruitful meeting is a three-way media release, between the SOS campaign, Swindon Borough Council and SevenCapital.
Note:There was much negotiation between all interested parties about the wording of this media statement. The campaign stresses that SevenCapitalshowed much willingness for the campaign to be as comfortable as possible that what went into the press release reflected their goals. Thus SevenCapitalagreed not to publish anything until all parties were comfortable.
The meeting discussed much that the campaign is not at liberty to publicly discuss. Such as why they were met with blanket radio silence from SevenCapital. But what the campaign cansay is that it seems that SevenCapital never had any intention of removing the leisure facilities from that site. How serious they were about that hastily drawn CGI put out to Swindonians back in March is unclear. But the important point is that channels of communication are now open.
The campaigners took the opportunity of the meeting to present Mr Siviter with physical copies of all the information they’ve gathered from a range of expert witnesses. Information that points to preserving the iconic dome – a key thrust of the campaign – to be entirely possible. And, what’s more, possible in a sustainable and ecological way.
The onus now rests on SevenCapital to prove absolutely that they cannot save the dome before Swindonians will consider accepting a replacement leisure centre. One that may well be very fine but will not be the Oasis that we know and love.
An aside
So above I’m writing as a member of the SOS campaign team. What’s coming now is my voice – me – Angela Atkinson as a Swindonian – albeit one with experience of the campaign. But speaking for ME and NOT for the campaign.
When Cllr Renard says in the official press release (link above): ‘ We’ve consistently said that SevenCapital’s plans are the best way forward for the Oasis, and securing its future has always been my top priority, I’m not sure if he’s on this earth or Fuller’s Earth.#sorry #notsorry
He, and in particular a certain member of his Cabinet have indeed been consistent. They’ve been consistent in stonewalling, deflecting, belittling and blocking concerned constituents and the SOS campaign itself on social media. This from public servants who are PAID TO LISTEN TO THEIR CONSTITUENTS. And being blocked by this person, means the campaign can’t respond.
I’m neither imagining nor exaggerating all this. Too many constituents have experienced it and know it. Thus there’s huge irony in the alluded to Cabinet member now accusing the SOS campaign of antagonism.
Experience of the past few months and what transpired at this meeting have made evident that clearer communications and less pathetic political posturing from the town’s administrative party would have made this whole sorry saga much less fraught than it became over the last few months.
The needless and endless deflection that simply angered and frustrated residents is nothing but self-defeating and exhausting for all.
A quick recap: this meeting between SevenCapital and the SOS campaign happened because SevenCapital contacted the campaign and requested a meeting. SBC played NO PART in this step forward and must not be allowed to claim any credit for it.
#justaying
In summary
The SOS campaign sees this development as a cause for cautious optimism for the future of the Oasis. But of course, much can happen in the next few months. As Swindon Viewpoint said on the end of one of the many splendid videos they made at the campaign’s recent rally, the Oasis isn’t saved until the doors swing open again.
So, there is still much to do and the campaign is in dire need of practical help. So, if you feel you can get involved, wave!
But for now, the campaign awaits the results of the listing application.
And on that note, an important reminder because there appears not to be clarity on this point. It wasn’t the SOS campaign that submitted the listing application. In th first instance an unknown individual submitted a listing application – soon followed by another one from the 20thCentury society.
After initial resistance, the campaign does now support the listing application yes. But that isn’t the same as being the instigator of it. There’s a world of difference in those two chunks of discourse.
Swindon artist and Old Town resident, David Bent is exhibiting at Tetbury Good’s Shed.
David’s Out of This World exhibition runs from 30th June to 29th August 2021. Opening times are 11-4pm Wednesdays through Sundays.
Andrew Morton of the Red Arrows wrote:
‘2006 saw the Red Arrows invite leading modern aviation artist David Bent to collaborate as Artist in Residence. This remains a positive and enduring goodwill relationship with David the artist most closely associated with the team. The team exhibits David’s work on the walls of the team’s Lincolnshire, RAF Scampton home. That includes in the crew briefing room.
With a wonderful use of colour, expert detail and creativity, David’s work showcases both the excitement of flight and its inherent beauty. David’s art reflects the precision and engineering excellence of the Royal Air Force Aerobatic Team. Further, he captures the imagination of those who see and draw inspiration from his pieces. Just as the Red Arrows do with every performance and display.’
About David
Awarded Honorary Companionship of the Royal Aeronautical Society, David is credited with leading a new movement in modern aviation art.
Recent exhibitions include: a. the National Memorial Arboretum b. St George’s Bristol c. Royal Air Force Museum d. Swindon Museum & Art Gallery and … c. … Russell Cotes Museum & Art Gallery.
20% percent of sales from this Out of This World exhibition at the Tetbury Good’s Shed will go straight to the venue to help them with their work.
