Working barge carries load into Leeds for first time in nearly 20 years

FOR those who have mourned the slow decline of the canals for commercial traffic, the return of a working barge to the Aire and Calder Navigation is like a “Phoenix rising from the ashes”.
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Fifth generation barge owner John Branford is due to arrive in Leeds on Tuesday with a 400-tonne load of gritsand - the first time in 19 years commercial freight will come into the city by barge.

Mr Branford, 75, has had to do battle with the Canal and River Trust (CRT), which is responsible for 2,000 miles of canals and rivers, for permission to offload at Knostrop Wharf, and still faces a significant hurdle, after being restricted to just 40 working hours on the canal a week.

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But seven years of dogged determination to find a wharf where he can unload paid off yesterday as he and son Jonathan, 39, got underway from Goole, with seven locks to go, before a scheduled arrival in Leeds this morning.

John Branford is a fifth generation barge operator Picture: James HardistyJohn Branford is a fifth generation barge operator Picture: James Hardisty
John Branford is a fifth generation barge operator Picture: James Hardisty

As the heavily-laden vessel passed under the busy M18 bridge, Mr Branford admitted there were times when he wondered whether he would ever get back to work on the canal again.

Captain of his first barge aged just 15, Mr Branford now operates three 500-tonne ex tanker barges which have been converted into bulk transporters.

The route takes him past landmarks his ancestors knew, including the chimney of the now defunct tarworks at New Bridge, where relatives used to load barrels of tar.

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For all the history Mr Branford, who has previously owned a haulage company, says barges are not a thing of the past, but of the future, being cheaper from A to B than lorries, and much kinder on the environment.

Farndale H en route to Leeds on Monday Picture: James HardistyFarndale H en route to Leeds on Monday Picture: James Hardisty
Farndale H en route to Leeds on Monday Picture: James Hardisty

Just the first load takes 14 HGVs off the roads, and “saves a small fortune in diesel”.

When Barbara Castle declared the Aire and Calder a freight navigation in 1968, there were at least 20 wharves to unload.

But for the past seven years, there hasn’t been one between Goole and Leeds.

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Mr Branford said: “This is the first time I've come up here in seven years and I'm enjoying it.

John Branford and son Jonathan Picture: James HardistyJohn Branford and son Jonathan Picture: James Hardisty
John Branford and son Jonathan Picture: James Hardisty

"When I asked the CRT can they give me a wharf they said there isn’t one. Literally all the infrastructure has been torn out for pleasure boats and fisherman and they have shoved the commercial side to the background.”

The latest problem is only being able to work from 8am to 4pm, five days a week.

"It is impossible to do this job and compete against the road if you are shut down 128 hours a week," said Mr Branford. "They don't take into consideration that the tide moves an hour every day."

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On board was waterways writer and photographer Jonathan Mosse, who praised the CRT for broadening the appeal of canals, but said they had “taken their eye off navigation.”

“It has gone right down to the bottom of the agenda. Why was it that they couldn’t do a simple job like make that wharf available so this could have started X years ago?

“It is not rocket science. It shouldn’t be just boatcentric, it should have a really broad appeal, but all this should be driven by navigation. It is getting the balance back.”

Son Jonathan, who is on leave from his job as captain of a vessel working on offshore wind farms, said it had been a “long slog”, but added: “I am really pleased about it and hopefully there’s a good future in it.”

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