Leeds and Liverpool Reservoirs: Slow Progress Continues

The levels of the four reservoirs dedicated to feeding the Leeds and Liverpool Canal's summit are continuing to fill slowly, but it will still be some time before British Waterways will be able to re-open the canal between Wigan and Gargrave.

The reservoirs are currently holding just 14.7% of their capacity, which is 1.6% more than last week's figure of 13.1%. At this time of year British Waterways would expect these levels to be around 60%. Levels will need to rise to around 20% before BW can consider re-opening the 60-mile closed section of canal.

While the two smallest reservoirs are currently more than 20% full, the largest of the four reservoirs, Lower Foulridge, is at just 10.4% of capacity and this has increased by only 0.2% in the last week.

The reservoir holdings as of 30th August were:

reservoir	capacity when full	current holding	percentage of capacity	change since last week
Lower Foulridge	1,557 million litres	162 million litres	10.4%	up 0.2%
Upper Foulridge	442 million litres	96 million litres	21.9%	up 3.7%
Slipperhill	170 million litres	50 million litres	29.7%	up 7.7%
Whitemoor	658 million litres	107 million litres	16.3%	up 2.2%
average holdings of these 4 reservoirs			14.7%	up 1.6%

BW is constantly reviewing the situation with all the reservoirs feeding the canal with the hope of re-opening the navigation as soon as this can be done. On Monday BW suggested to the Lancashire Telegraph that the canal could remain closed until October.

The reservoir at Winterburn (capacity 1,270 million litres) is not included in these calculations at present because of BW's statutory obligation to supply a compensation feed back into the Eshton Beck (although some of this is being fed into the canal at Holme Bridge to maintain levels through to Skipton and Bingley).

The feed to the Leeds and Liverpool Canal summit was cut at the start of August, when reservoir levels were approaching 10%, resulting in the current closure of the sixty miles of waterway between Gargrave and Wigan. Some water has to be left in each reservoir to preserve the wildlife.

Foulridge Upper Reservoir. Photo: Richard Carpenter