Bridges: Runnymede and Weybridge

(asked on 20th January 2025) - View Source

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, pursuant to the Answer of 23 October 2024 on Bridges: Runnymede and Weybridge, if he will make an assessment of the potential impact of the Environment Agency's response to the closure of bridge 142 on public safety.


Answered by
Emma Hardy Portrait
Emma Hardy
Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
This question was answered on 23rd January 2025

The Thames towpath provides health and wellbeing benefits to many communities, as well as being an important access route.

The Environment Agency’s (EA’s) towpath bridge refurbishments are considered within their overall Navigation capital programme. Each project is evaluated against its impact on customer safety, income generation, water level management, design complexity, cost, and impact on the Navigation service. This programme is refreshed each year to maximise the benefits for Navigation customers within the grant-in-aid allocation the EA receives from the Government.

The EA is now exploring how partnership funding could be used alongside the grant-in-aid funding it receives from the Government for bridge refurbishment projects.

In the meantime, temporary security fencing has been put in place to safeguard members of the public while the necessary funding is secured to refurbish the bridge, and a footpath diversion remains in place.

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