River Tyne – The Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) have significant funding available to assist with restoration of watercourses in Scotland and one priority for this funding is improving fish passage at man-made obstacles.

A funding application has now received approval to support a professional assessment and engineering report on most of the weirs on the River Tyne. The aim of the first part of this project is to commission a fish pass specialist to examine each weir and provide a costed solution to improve fish passage.

Around 60% funding of the cost of each report is available from SEPA for this purpose. Once the reports and plans have been drawn up, the second stage would be to present the findings to SEPA and then apply for funding support to begin the necessary remedial works highlighted in each report. This second phase will probably be costly, and whilst funding support may be secured from SEPA, the ELAA would have to explore other funding avenues to match this.

The RFFT may be in a position to assist with some contributory support to help deliver these assessments in 2009.