Canal restorers in South Wales are celebrating the biggest single grant for a waterway restoration project for several years.
The grant consists of £8m of European cash plus matching funding from other sources.
The money will pay for a project to extend the canal south from the existing terminus, through a difficult section with many partially demolished locks including the Five Locks flight and several blocked road bridges, to reach the centre of Cwmbran.
Together with the current volunteer project to restore a flight of locks heading north from the outskirts of Newport, this will shorten the ‘missing link’ of derelict canal, and will be a major step forwards towards the complete opening of the canal all the way through from Brecon to Newport, up the Crumlin Arm to Cwmcarn, and into the River Usk via a new link at Crindau.
