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What next for the viaduct? T
Erewash Mayor’s Community Award Winner
MARCH 2018
A community publication for Ilkeston and surrounding area ilkestonlife.com
Inside: Victory for the Hazelwood campaigners, P3 ‘Were you ‘ashed’ on the Market Place? P7 Inspiring teachers at Gladstone and Hallcroft, P9 & 10 Scouts at camp, P13 The Church Lads who didn’t come back from war, P14 Ilkeston Town FC round-up, P24
he Bennerley Viaduct project, which has caught the imagination of the communities of the Erewash Valley over the last couple of years, will not be going ahead as planned, a meeting at the Gate Inn, Awsworth, was told on Monday 12th February.
mation in a timely fashion. “There have been two massive consequences,” the chairman told the meeting. “In the short term, both volunteers and project staff were carrying on with their work in local communities and on the Bennerley site, unaware that the project had been dropped. It also meant that the Friends were unable to argue the case for resubmitting the project.” The Friends have also questioned the reasons given for the decision. The difficulty of raising match funding was always known and a solution to the problem was actually included in the first phase of the project in the form of a Funding and Philanthropy Officer. “We feel strongly that the bid could and should have been reworked and submitted at the next opportunity, “ said the chairman. MEETING With this in mind the Friends’ committee attended a meeting in Nottingham with the chairs and CEO’s of both Sustrans and RPL on 15th February. The Friends put forward the idea of a new partnership to explore other funding sources, allowing the original project, with any necessary improvements, to be submitted to HLF. Sustrans and RPL agreed to come forward with alternative schemes requiring less funding, and all options would be on the table for discussion at a further meeting of all parties. Local MPs Maggie Throup (Erewash) and Anna Soubry (Broxtowe) have always supported the project and have offered to help keep it alive by bringing together existing and potential new partners. “We know that Ilkeston people and others in the Erewash valley will be as disappointed as we were by this news,” Jeff Wynch told Ilkeston Life. “The bid would not have done nearly as well as it did without the massive community engagement that HLF always look for. We are determined that it should not be wasted and that there will still be a project that we can all get behind in the near future.”
Among those present were Councillors Robert Flatley (Derbyshire County Council) and James Dawson (Erewash Borough Council), both strong supporters of the project. A bid to the Heritage Lottery Fund by Sustrans, the sustainable transport charity, was very close to success in December, coming fourth out of 17 projects being considered. The first three projects shared £10 million in grants. Bids of this size, approximately £4.5 million, rarely succeed at the first attempt, but the Heritage Lottery Fund was impressed by it, and encouraged Sustrans to resubmit with some revisions. Jeff Wynch, chairman of the Friends of Bennerley Viaduct, told the gathering that he and the committee had been shocked and disappointed to be told that Sustrans would not be doing so. The “Iron Giant” belongs to Railway Paths Ltd., a charity set up in the 1990s to take over some of the assets of British Rail, such as disused bridges and lines. Sustrans designs and manages projects to bring them back into public use. RISK Sustrans have given financial risk and changing priorities as reasons for the decision. Heritage Lottery Fund projects always require “match funding” to be put in by the bidder, but Sustrans now feel that raising the amount asked for is unlikely. They also claim that the project does not fit in with their overall strategy or their plans for the National Cycle Network. Neither the Friends, who were key partners in the project, nor local project staff employed by Sustrans, was involved in the decision, and they did not hear about it until weeks later. They registered a complaint with Xavier Brice, Sustrans Chief Jeff Wynch 07443 452908 Executive, about the lack of consultation j.wynch@btinternet.com and the failure to communicate infor-