Buckingham Canal Society Progress Report

• The BCS prospectus has now been completed and circulated to the relevant bodies.

• The Committee has agreed to and commissioned an Ecological Study to begin on March 21st weather permitting. This is a major step forward in the Society's strategic plan.

• On the 27th April the Society will be hosting a meeting of the IWA Restoration Committee at Cosgrove on board "Elizabeth of Glamis" by kind permission of Steve Miles. After the formal meeting in the morning RESCOM members will meet the BCS Committee and representatives from other IWA branches for lunch at the Navigation Inn at Castlethorpe. They will then visit the restoration site in the afternoon.

• Roger Hanbury from the Waterways Trust met with Committee members on September 18th at Cosgrove to view the site and, while no money for restoration was forthcoming, we have established a contact for assistance and Roger left with a better knowledge of the Society's aims
  You will have seen Athina Beckett's work party reports in this and past issues of the Navigator, so suffice to say that if you can find the time to walk the sections under restoration you will notice that great progress has indeed been made.

• At the Buckingham end the canal bed can now be seen from the kissing gates at Bourton Meadow down to the Lock Cottage.

• At the Cosgrove A5 end the canal bed is now very visible to Dogsmouth brook, with the remaining section on to Cosgrove beginning to look like an empty canal bed should, with a good and clear towpath, all of which the work parties can be very proud of.

• The Society is now a member of the Milton Keynes Heritage Association. Jeremy Cooper has revamped our web site and the MKHA now hosts it at www.mkheritage.co.uk/bcs
  With the assistance of the MKHA we are getting help and training to build a new web page showing a virtual tour of the canal and points of interest with photos and text. When finished in the next few months Jeremy will be adding this to the web site.

In mentioning Jeremy Cooper I would like to express my thanks and that of the Committee for his help and guidance with the production of the Navigator: without his assistance it would have been difficult to produce four issues a year.