There’s a real sense of momentum on the Cotswold Canals this summer, as the Cotswold Canals Trust’s excavation team makes a start on the so-called ‘Missing Mile’.

Excavators and dumper trucks have assembled between John Robinson Lock and the M5 underpass, where roughly 750 metres of new channel needs to be dug, shaped and lined with clay. The four dumpers — bought second-hand from a nuclear power station site — have been re-shod with wider cross-country tyres to cope with the fields and haul roads.

The team began with a deep test pit, which quickly revealed two challenges: a water table just a metre down, and a huge volume of spoil to store. Some of that material is rising into a new local landmark the volunteers have nicknamed ‘Mount Oldbury’, while the rest is being sorted into topsoil, subsoil, clay and gravel for re-use in flood banks and towpaths. Now 12 strong, the crew hopes to connect through to John Robinson Lock by the end of the year.

Read the full update from the Cotswold Canals Trust here: The Start of the Missing Mile.