The Mersey Gateway Bridge crosses the Sankey canal which is suffering from low water levels following the closing of Fiddlers Ferry power station.
Cw 8024 Sankey canal low on water The Sankey canal with low water levels on Tuesday the 7th June 2022 under the Mersey gateway road bridge. The Sankey canal is suffering from low water levels from Fiddlers Ferry to Spike Island. This was the first canal of the industrial revolution, opening in 1757, 4 years before the Bridgewater canal, which was used to carry coal from the St Helens area to Liverpool, locking down into the River Mersey at Sankey bridges near Warrington. It was eventually extended past Fiddlers Ferry to lock down into the Mersey at Spike Island in Widnes. The Mersey Gateway Bridge was opened in 2017 to ease traffic pressures on the nearby Runcorn Bridge. Commercial traffic finished on the canal in 1959 and the canal fell into dereliction. However since 1983 the canal was supplied by water from the Fiddlers Ferry electricity power station that was opened in 1971. At the power stations height of production it could use up to 195 million lts of water a day, drawn from the River Mersey and some of it made its way back in to the river via the Sankey canal. The power station was decommissioned in 2020 with pumps supplying the canal being turned off. This has resulted in the water level along this length of the canal dropping with effects on the local wild life and the fish stocks. The canal is maintained by the Halton Borough Council who have organized a fish rescue and for a time where funding pumps to fill the canal, but this has now ceased, though the council are looking to find a long term solution. A unintended consequence of the fight against climate Photo image Cw 8024 Copyright Colin Wareing e-mail 07931 356204 Photo by Colin Wareing Cw 8024
Size: 3880px × 2660px
Location: Sankey Canal, Carterhouse, Widnes, Cheshire, England.
Photo credit: © Colin Wareing / Alamy / Afripics
License: Royalty Free
Model Released: No
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