Grant helps LUCS look to the future

Linlithgow Union Canal Society have been awarded a substantial grant by Museum Galleries Scotland to upgrade their online booking system, providing tourists and visitors to the canal basin with a modern user friendly and contactless system to access all the facilities at this popular tourist attraction and community facility.

The Society, which is totally run by volunteers, looks after and runs all the facilities at the Canal Basin in Linlithgow, a venue that includes Scotland’s only Canal Museum housed in the former canal stable buildings. The Museum displays exhibits and exhibition boards relating to the building, operation, decline and revival of the Scottish lowland canals. These include old photographs, boat models, original tools and equipment and objects from the working life of the canal as well as natural history information. LUCS also recently developed and launched a digital archive of images relating to the history of the canal available on-line for all to see.

But, as Mike Smith, Vice Chair at LUCS says “the museum is just one part of the Society’s heritage offering which includes boat trips along the canal with commentary and guide cards provided. There is also a tea room and a fully equipped educational centre on the site which is regularly used for school visits. The whole centre is normally open at weekends from April to September and all week during the summer school holidays. The museum can also be opened out with normal times for viewing by appointment. The grant from Museum Galleries Scotland will enable us to continue our full heritage offering to the public just as soon as we are able to open again after Covid.”

Lucy Casot, CEO of Museums Galleries Scotland said: “We are delighted to support Linlithgow Union Canal Society through the Recovery and Resilience Fund. They have responded to the challenges of the pandemic, and subsequent temporary closure, by welcoming their visitors remotely through increased digital access to the museum archive and making plans for upgrades to accessing the museum and visitor attraction. Their response is a credit to the hard work of the volunteers, and we wish them every success as they work to safely reopen the museum in 2021.”

The Canal Centre at Linlithgow is scheduled to open for the 2021 season early in April, and the volunteers are already preparing to operate under whatever Covid restrictions are in place at the time.