Tourists to flow in all year

Stourport-on-Severn has been a summertime playground for daytrippers from the West Midlands since Victorian times but now there are plans to extend its tourist season.

Waterway officials hope a £3.2million project currently being carried out will bring a new look to the Stourport Basins and help attract a steady stream of visitors throughout the year with the help of events such as costumed guide walks.

These have already been tried out with great success and now British Waterways is hoping a series of walks throughout 2007 will put the town on the map.

Heritage Lottery Funding of £1.7million was gained towards the scheme to restore and improve the basins and surrounding canal and riverside areas.

It is hoped this work, already halfway complete, will eventually help create as many as 70 new jobs for the town.

The project includes restoration of the historic warehouses, cottages and other structures around the basins.

There will also be improvements to the locks, basin walls and basins along with landscaping work, better access as well as work to protect wildlife, community involvement and arts projects.

Engineers have been replacing damaged brick work in the lock chambers and reseating coping stones at the water's edge and around bridges and filling the voids behind lock walls.

Spokesman for British Waterways Nicky Lister said: "We are halfway through the £3.2 million project, of which £1.7 million is from the Heritage Lottery Fund.

"We are 18 months into a major three-year project and at the moment the really mucky stuff is going on with engineering work on the ground.

"From March through to September next year we will be re-instating these areas and carrying out landscaping and improving access as well as looking at where benches might be installed.

"There will also be opportunities for people locally to help by volunteering for a variety of activities such as helping with planting and smaller restoration projects such as the installation of new railings and costumed events.

"We tried costumed guided walks last spring and they proved really popular so we plan to do more this year - on March 10 and March 11 we will be promoting the area as a place to visit next summer through a basins heritage trail."