Tag: Ulster Canal

The Irish Independent reports that the National Asset Management Agency, the Sate body setup in the aftermath of the property price crash at the end of the Celtic Tiger, has disposed of its last Dublin Docklands interest – a leasehold interest on a property adjacent to the Grand Canal Dock. The buyer of this property is none other than the freehold owner – Waterways Ireland.

I fear that WI may be trying to follow the CIE model of being a property development company with the inconvenience of a linear transport network attached. Having said that, there is a fine site for house boats in Clones – I could see WI getting into the international protection accommodation market by setting up something similar to these on the marina in Clones.

The spending by the occupants would bring economic development to Clones – after all, wasn’t that the plan?

Well, that was, underwhelming.

I paid a visit to Clones on Sunday to see this marvellous new canal, that is going to be the leading tourist attraction of South Ulster. The place was hopping with……

Well, not much really. Plenty of people walking, three water bikes for hire and a few canoes. Who’d have seen that coming.

I’ll have a full report soon (currently in Prague on holiday). However, a news article in the Anglo Celt caught my eye. It reports the CEO of Waterways Ireland, John McDonagh, stating that negotiations with landowners along the route of the canal between Clonfad and Castle Saunderson are taking place.

Are you stating, John, that you won’t have powers of Compulsory Purchase for this wonderful tourist attraction? Oh wait, no, the NI Government can see this as the white elephant that it is and sensibly won’t touch it with a bargepole.

Below is a Googlemaps view of Clonfad and the border:

Google hasn’t caught up with the new waterway yet. This ends in a field just at the border with Northern Ireland. The last section of the waterway is on a new alignment as there is a house in the way of the original alignment.

The thought struck me, that if the adjacent landowner(s) don’t want to play ball and either refuse to sell, or, better still, offers to sell, say, a 10m wide stretch of land running from the A3 ESE across the canal bed for 100m, to someone like me, the Ulster Canal is dead.

Thejournal.ie reports that Phase 2 of Thon Sheugh, sorry, the Ulster Canal for those of us who are not illiterate, is opening.

From the blurb, you would think that this was something wonderful, describing this as the opening of the canal from Clones to Clonfad.

It is only when you get to the bottom of the article and you read this:

“Phase three of the restoration, when complete, will link phases one and two, and fully reopen the waterway from Clones to Lough Erne.”

that you realise that you, the taxpayer, have been conned.

What has been opened is an elongated, open air swimming pool in Clones. I am looking forward to visiting Clones shortly to count the boats on this new section of Sheugh.

Northern Sound have reported on a call by Waterways Ireland, Monaghan County Council and Failte Ireland, who are collectively seeking “to engage with those who might be interested in delivering a high-quality visitor experience with a focus on both on-water and land-based activities, from a new facility being developed in Clones.” (read: to encourage businesses to destroy their capital ).

It is time for a reality check here. What is being developed in Clones is a half mile long open air swimming pool with the potential to become a floating halting site. It will be unconnected to anything else for the foreseeable future (and with any luck, for ever).

Even if the WI and Sinn Fein wet dream of a “restored” Ulster Canal came into existence, Clones will be the terminus of a long branch line at the end of the network. No-one is going to base a boat there long term as based on maximum speeds on the canals to prevent wash damage, half a day of each journey will be wasted getting to/from Clones to the rest of the network.

As such, anyone putting money into any such business venture(s) may as well just take cash out of the bank and burn it.

Thon Sheugh, to use the phrase coined by the late Brian J Goggin, continues to generate copy, to the extent that it makes me wish for another recession to deprive the Irish Government of money and bring the IMF back.

I came upon this article, which is nothing more than pious platitudes from people who want to spend taxpayers’ money, solely because they can. From the article:

“The Taoiseach, Micheál Martin, has called Waterways Ireland’s Ulster Canal restoration project a “long-standing government priority, with an important north-south dimension”.

Like draining the Shannon or restoring the Irish language as a living language. It is hyperbole, designed to play to an audience but not intended to be a commitment.

Dating back to the mid-19th century, the Ulster Canal formed a strategic link between the waterways of Ireland but, by the 1930s, a drop in its usage for commercial purposes saw the abandonment of the canal which then led to its deterioration.

The Ulster Canal was anything but strategic. It was a white elephant even upon opening, due to small size of the canal locks and difficulties keeping the summit level in water. Within a generation, the arrival of the railway killed off any prospect the canal could have had (but didn’t), rendering it as nothing more than an expensive drainage channel.

The second phase, which is now being progressed thanks to the Irish Government funding, focuses on Monaghan – from Clones to Clonfad. Mr McMahon is hopeful that this phase will be completed by the end of 2023.

I have discussed this previously. This is a short section of canal, disconnected from anything else – effectively just an elongated open air swimming pool on the outskirts of Clones. This is akin to the building of the Kilkenny Canal from the Kilkenny end, rather than the Inistioge end (end of river navigation), which meant that the built section could not be used commercially and therefore failed.

The Irish Government should focus on the creation and completion of the Ulster Canal Greenway and accommodate the built heritage of the Ulster Canal by leaving the bridge towpaths and locks intact by running the cycle path element of the greenway along the bed of the former canal and through the locks. The footpath element can use the original towpaths and have ramp access to the public roads at each bridge for disabled/family access.