A Shop-front for SCARS?

We are more and more looking at ways in which members can become a little more involved in their organisation and we are well aware that, whilst supporting the aims of the Society in wanting a full return to navigable status of the waterway, many of our members are not able, through possibly physical and/or time constraints, to play a more active part in practical work. It, too, has to be said that many of the team are “getting on a little” and hard restoration work will soon be have to be handed on to a generation still not involved in the preservation and restoration culture.

That day is not yet with us but we need to plan our strategy for the future and to ensure that we leave a lasting legacy and a firm basis for the fight to be carried on into next decade or so.

It is with this in mind that we have recently been in discussions with St Helens Council over a possible partnership aimed at the operation and management of the Sankey Valley Visitor Centre (left) and its conversion into an industrial- and natural history-based heritage unit with its emphasis on the Sankey Canal, its historical legacy, its place in the birth of the industrial revolution in these parts and the part it has to play in the leisure and recreational patterns of our lives today.

The venture would therefore enable SCARS to once again have a base, but this time one in which all the many strands of our Society could work together, and that those with historical interests can link up with the restoration crews and the wildlife lovers to forge together a fitting exhibition and activity centre for our Society’s varied membership.

The talks are still on going and many decisions are yet to be made but I feel it is now right to ask the membership in general for their input as we feel that we really do need to involve more people in the activities we pursue and consider that involvement in a project such as this would allow more to get involved with as much time as their inclination or interest might take them. The project has untold opportunities for people of all interests and its success would really put the SCARS well in the public eye locally, regionally and beyond whilst not diminishing its prime aim of restoring the canal to use from the River Mersey to the town.

Please do let us have your views on this venture, and get in touch with me by any of the contact means given.

Dave Smallshaw , Communications Officer

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