Category Archives: Waterways management

Buggering up the Barrow

Posted on Sunday 11 September 2011 | 2 comments

Have you ever wondered, as you grounded on a sand bar or fought a current upstream, quite why the River Barrow is so challenging?

Here is a confession (with photos) from the man wot done it — in 1931 ….

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Posted in Built heritage, Economic activities, Engineering and construction, Extant waterways, Industrial heritage, Ireland, Irish inland waterways vessels, Irish waterways general, Operations, People, Sources, The turf trade, waterways, Waterways management

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New Junction Canal (SEW) bridge

Posted on Monday 5 September 2011 | Leave a comment

The Anglo-Celt reports that Ballyconnell, Co Cavan, is to have a new “inner relief road” (a cure for indigestion?). The road will cross the Junction Canal (Shannon–Erne Waterway), or Woodford Canal as the newspaper calls it, on “an expansive new bridge”:

The bridge has to allow enough clearance for boating traffic on the canal. The new road will come out past the Old Ennis Mill location and just before the Quinn cement plant.

The work is to be finished by August 2012. The Waterways Ireland website has, as yet, no information about any interruption to navigation during construction.

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Posted in Ashore, Economic activities, Engineering and construction, Extant waterways, Ireland, Irish waterways general, Non-waterway, Waterways management

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Uncle Gaybo …

Posted on Sunday 28 August 2011 | Leave a comment

… bigs it up for the Barrow, specifically a walk from Graiguenamanagh to St Mullins.

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Posted in Ashore, Built heritage, Engineering and construction, Extant waterways, Ireland, Irish inland waterways vessels, Natural heritage, Tourism, Water sports activities, waterways, Waterways management

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Forts, weirs, piers, power stations …

Posted on Friday 26 August 2011 | Leave a comment

… just some of the things you can see from the Killimer to Tarbert ferry.

Actually, I lied about the weirs, but they were there once. As were the salmon.

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Posted in Ashore, Built heritage, Charles Wye Williams, Economic activities, Engineering and construction, Extant waterways, Industrial heritage, Ireland, Irish inland waterways vessels, Irish waterways general, Natural heritage, Non-waterway, Operations, Scenery, shannon estuary, Sources, Steamers, The cattle trade, The fishing trade, The turf trade, Tourism, waterways, Waterways management, Weather

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Championing waterways heritage

Posted on Thursday 25 August 2011 | Leave a comment

O’Briensbridge, covered here on this site, makes the front page of the Clare Champion this week.

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Posted in Built heritage, Charles Wye Williams, Economic activities, Engineering and construction, Extant waterways, Forgotten navigations, Industrial heritage, Ireland, Irish waterways general, Operations, People, Politics, Restoration and rebuilding, Steamers, The cattle trade, The turf trade, Tourism, waterways, Waterways management

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The drowning of the Celtic Tiger

Posted on Monday 22 August 2011 | Leave a comment

Valerie Anex’s photos of ghost estates, many on the Upper Shannon and the Shannon–Erne Waterway, are worth a look. Flash is required. Some more of them here, where you can see them in high resolution.

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Posted in Ashore, Economic activities, Engineering and construction, Extant waterways, Ireland, Irish waterways general, Operations, Politics, Scenery, Tourism, waterways, Waterways management

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The Blocks in the Docks

Posted on Monday 15 August 2011 | 3 comments

Waterways Ireland’s visitor centre in Dublin, known as the Box in the Docks, has been closed for some time. I don’t know whether it has yet been reopened, but it has a new website.

If you are pained by greengrocers’ apostrophes, don’t go there. The main problem, though, is that the website says nothing about what is in the Box. Why “Plan a visit” if you don’t know what you’ll see when you get there?

Perhaps it’s a work in progress, with more to be added later, but I’d welcome information about what’s in the centre from anyone who has visited it recently.

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Posted in Ashore, Economic activities, Engineering and construction, Extant waterways, Ireland, Operations, Tourism, Waterways management

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A new activity

Posted on Monday 8 August 2011 | Leave a comment

Trainspotters have it easy: even if they run out of engines to record, they can fall back on writing down the numbers of carriages.

There is less scope on the waterways, with relatively few working boats. However, Waterways Ireland seems to have a sizeable fleet of land vehicles, so we could record all of them … and, in the process, find out how many land vehicles WI actually operates.

I’ve started here with some pics of vehicles on the Shannon–Erne Waterway, but I’d like your help. If you spot a WI vehicle, photograph it and send the pic to me (reduced to less than 300 KB) with a note of when and where you saw the vehicle and, if possible, information on what it was doing. I’d also like you to give me permission to use the photo on the vehicles web page (but you will still own the copyright).

Just think, we could be just like those interesting chaps who photograph Eddie Stobart trucks ….

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Posted in Ashore, Economic activities, Engineering and construction, Extant waterways, Ireland, Irish waterways general, Operations, waterways, Waterways management

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Buried at the crossroads …

Posted on Sunday 7 August 2011 | Leave a comment

… but without a stake through its heart. The Ulster Canal is dead, but it’s spinning in its grave. Its parent department has admitted some of the truth about its funding, but Waterways Ireland will be applying for planning permission for the scheme: there’s enough money for that, but not for digging. Nonetheless, Fine Gael TDs have managed to distract attention from the absence of funding by pointing to the planning application, while Sinn Féin and Fianna Fáil have not realised that a scheme’s benefits should outweigh its costs. Return of the Son of the Ghost of the Bride of the Ulster Canal on view here.

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Posted in Economic activities, Engineering and construction, Extant waterways, Foreign parts, Industrial heritage, Ireland, Operations, People, Politics, Restoration and rebuilding, Tourism, waterways, Waterways management

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Waterways users

Posted on Thursday 4 August 2011 | 2 comments

What are waterways halting-sites or harbours used for? After some time spent on the Shannon–Erne Waterway, I can say that they’re not just for cruising boaters. Other users included:

  • sales reps (or other management types with their suit jackets on hangers in the back) needing cheap, clean loos on their journeys
  • local owners of jetskis and speedboats, launching for an evening run
  • anglers, both on shore and in boats
  • campers
  • campervanners seeking free, relatively secure overnight stops with good facilities
  • walkers and cyclists, including some long-distance chaps taking breaks
  • seekers after water.

At Ballyconnell, a chap drove down in an elderly tractor with three blue barrels on the back, filled up with water and drove away. He was followed by a couple in a 2011 Cavan-registered Renault Fluence, with six 2-litre plastic containers in the boot, who also filled up and drove off. [I have photos of both the tractor and the car.] When water is charged for by the amount used, Waterways Ireland may have to consider locking its taps.

 

 

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Posted in Ashore, Economic activities, Engineering and construction, Extant waterways, Ireland, Non-waterway, Operations, People, Tourism, Water sports activities, waterways, Waterways management

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