Boats from the national waterways network will return to the first ten miles of the Cotswold Canals from Saul Junction to the Golden Valley above Stroud, following final confirmation of a £9m National Lottery Heritage Fund grant which forms the largest part of a £l6m package. A six-mile length of canal from Stonehouse via Stroud to Thrupp has already been restored thanks to earlier Lottery funding and other grants - but as an isolated section with no connection to the rest of the canal system. The funding package, which also includes contributions from the Cotswold Canals Trust, Stroud District Council and the Canal & River Trust, now makes it possible to open the crucial four-mile 'missing link' from Saul to Stonehouse, opening up a ten mile length to visiting craft. There is also the prospect of extending it further up the valley to a new terminus at Brimscombe Port, a filled-in former transhipment basin earmarked for recreation as the centrepiece of a regeneration scheme.
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