AS THE result of a number of technical and 'operational details' which have yet to be finalised, as of April, there will be slight British Waterways boundary changes.
A 1km length of the Staffordshire & Worcestershire Canal, incorporating Stourport Basins and a 4km length of the Worcester & Birmingham Canal from Kings Norton Junction to the south portal of Wast Hill Tunnel at Hopwood Cutting will be affected.
To West Midlands team
These areas will be transferred from the South Wales & Severn Waterway (under manager, Nick Worthington and his team) to the West Midlands (under manager, Dean Davies and his team).
The reasons given for these changes are:
- Better alignment with local authority boundaries
- Better alignment with stakeholders (for example, volunteer groups, community groups, canal societies and regeneration/enterprise areas)
- Efficiencies in redeployment of resources and operational bases (for example, to deploy staff on the Droitwich Canal)
The changes do not include transferring any permanent staff, but seasonal staff and volunteers based at Stourport will be affected. Both waterways will be working with those affected to ensure that the switchover causes the least disruption possible.