Talk:Clywedog Reservoir

Which city/town?

Which city/town does the reservoir feed? {I know some/many of the welsh ones are primarily for Birmingham, for example, which is far from any suitable water source} Graldensblud 01:46, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

The water does not feed via pipe to any town/city. However, as it is used to Control the with in the River Severn it can effectively be used to supply the west midlands as water is pulled out of the severn at Kidderminster. Hope that helps. --Fuelboy 16:34, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

Birmingham?

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Discussion relating to how the issue of this being a reservoir built in Wales primarily for the purpose of serving English cities should be handled within the article. Theknightwho (talk) 23:24, 8 August 2021 (UTC)

I have reverted to the previous cited text. While the reverting edit summary ("Clywedog water has never gone to Birmingham only to South Staff and to Severn Trent for areas south of Birmingham. Birmingham remains reliant on Elan Valley. Perhaps Birmingma sounded better to Halcrows than South Staffs !") may well be true, it is not for editors to choose which reliable sources to believe, without corroborating sources. The reference stated “The Clywedog Dam in Wales was built to supply Birmingham and the Midlands with an extra 50 billion litres of water.”, which is pretty straightforward (unless the source - the builders- is suspect, in which case a query to WP:RSN should be made). The references provided for the change were tenuous, at best. For example, the first citation didn't even mention Clywedog reservoir. I had a look at the South Staffs Water site. They make few references to Clywedog. Here they say “River Severn - Clywedog Reservoir is being used by the Environment Agency to release water into the River Severn to support river flows.”. From my understanding of their site, they abstract water from the River Severn, as do other water companies, but they do not source directly from Clywdog Reservoir and claim no control over it. In fact, Severn Trent Water are the owners. If the second reference supports the statement that “the reservoir was built … to provide additional security of supply to the South Stafforshire area and other parts of the English Midlands.” please quote the relevant text from the citation, as I was unable to find it. Thanks, Daicaregos (talk) 20:44, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

OK lets give it a go. A map of all of severn Trent Water's rivers can be found at [1] - it is very large and takes an age to load. The abstraction points from the rivers can be seen at [2]. The areas supplied from these can then be seen in a slightly sketchy map in [3] on page 28. This shows the aqueducts that convey water and clearly shows the Elan valley connection to Birmingham. The sketchy nature of this map also suggests an aqueduct from Trimpley WTW to join the Birmingham aqueduct. This is a false impression. At both here [4] and her [5] there is confirmation that this works supplies North Worcestershire and South Shropshire. Because the Birmingham aqueduct is a gravity main all the way from Wales it would, in any case be very difficult and expensive to inject lower level river water into the main. Is this convincing enough?  Velella  ^{Velella Talk}   00:20, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

No need to convince anyone. All that is needed is a WP:RS that states The Clywedog Reservoir was built to supply South Staffs and the English Midlands. Daicaregos (talk) 08:31, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

I am confused. I have cited two separate refs, one from Cema and one from Enterprise Works, both organisations as reputable as Halcrows and both of which say Trimpley works serves Worcestershire and Shropshire (i.e. not Birmingma). The other references above clearly show no other possible source of water from the Severn that could feed Birmingham. What should we now conclude ? That Halcrow's ref trumps all others ? We have two reputable sources that clearly state that Trimpley does not supply Birmingham. Are there others sources which can explain how Birmingham is supposed to get its water from the Severn ?  Velella  ^{Velella Talk}   13:46, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

In addition this paper [6] clearly shows the Birmingham supply area as a wholly distinct supply area from the rest of Severn Trent Water's supply area - data provided by Severn Trent to the authors of the paper  Velella  ^{Velella Talk}   20:33, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

That Trimpley works serves Worcestershire and Shropshire rather than Birmingham is not disputed. It is quite likely that the Clywedog Reservoir now supplies South Staffs and the English Midlands, and I have no reason to doubt your research. And if an RS reference can be found to say so explicitly, it should be added to the article. However, the Halcrow reference states “The Clywedog Dam in Wales was built to supply Birmingham and the Midlands with an extra 50 billion litres of water.” It's may not have turned out that way, but the reference is quite explicit as to the reason the reservoir was built. It would be worth looking at the original Act of Parliament to see if the purpose was noted there. Daicaregos (talk) 20:55, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

One day I will find time to access the actual Bill and quote it here. Regrettably it is not in the National Archives but a copy is held in Bristol. I may also be able to persuade one of my colleagues in the industry to dig me out a copy. I was around when this was being debated and built and was involved in the definition of post construction operational rules, but I know Wikipedia well enough that I need to produce sources to substantiate what I know to be true. However in the meantime a book written in 1972 "Water in Britain: A Study in Applied Hydrology and Resource Geography" p196 contains the following passage

"The chief function of the reservoir is river regulation...."

It carries out in a similar vein but to quote more might breach copyright. I have added this as a ref to the article.  Velella  ^{Velella Talk}   19:08, 22 September 2018 (UTC)

You purposely misquote the Act. So many times (since 2012) you have attempted to cloudy the waters. Your above quote is not from the Act of Parliament, but from the editor, Keith Smith. It's his own opinion. You didn't quote the rest of the book because it is obviously not from the Act of Parliament, and this is deceiving. The book was written after the construction of the dam and says: "The chief function of the reservoir is river regulation. The reservoir, which has a capacity of 50 x 106 m3.... provides minimum discharge of ...". What you have done here is wrong; you have attempted to hide the fact that the main purpose of this (and other) reservoirs was to supply Welsh water to England. Since 2012 you have made many such political edits / untruths, on this article (here in 2012 and here in 2018] and again here, and others. On several occations you have deleted citations to the fact that it supplies water to England. I have one question to you: 'are you employed by any water company or in the water industry? Cell Danwydd (talk) 21:12, 4 September 2020 (UTC)

@Daicaregos: @Velella: @Cell Danwydd: I have added a quote directly from the legislation, and have provided a URL source from the Parliamentary Archives which contains a PDF copy of the Act itself. I can confirm definitively that the quote Velella has been reinstating is not from the Act itself. Hopefully, this matter should now be settled.

I also don't want to wade into the politics of abstracting water from Wales to England, but the long title notes the (original) constituent bodies of the reservoir's regulating board, and for the most part they are English local authorities and water boards:

An Act to constitute the Clywedog Reservoir Joint Authority consisting of representatives of the lord mayors, aldermen and citizens of the cities of Birmingham and Coventry, the mayors, aldermen and burgesses of the boroughs of Shrewsbury and Wolverhampton, the mayor, aldermen and citizens of the city of Worcester, the Bristol Waterworks Company, the Central Electricity Generating Board, the Cheltenham and Gloucester Joint Water Board, the East Shropshire Water Board, the East Worcestershire Waterworks Company, the Montgomeryshire Water Board, the South Staffordshire Waterworks Company, the county council of the administrative county of Montgomery and the Severn River Board, to empower the Clywedog Reservoir Joint Authority to acquire lands, to construct works and to regulate the flow of water in the river Severn; to confer powers upon the constituent authorities of the said Authority; and for other purposes.

Theknightwho (talk) 18:39, 3 August 2021 (UTC)

You misquoted. I'm astounded! Your partial quote gives a total different meaning! I've now included the missing bits (...) from the quote; please don't attempt this kind of pov on Wikipedia again. The full text mentions the future: the future needs of statutory water undertakers and others (named in section (2) and (3). And you did that in order to slant the reader's opinion. Pro-English, anti-Welsh POV. I've now reinstated the full quote (section 6) together with those which it refers to. The Act gives authority for a new reservoir as they needed more water going into the river, so that they could take more water out of the river, for English towns and cities. Cell Danwydd (talk) 16:48, 7 August 2021 (UTC)

@Cell Danwydd: I did that in order to retain what I - at the time - thought was the point of the paragraph, which was to give a brief explanation as to the point of the reservoir. What it said was not wrong or even misleading, as (in conjunction with the later sentence in the introductory paragraph that it was built to serve the West Midlands) it merely explained that the reservoir was built because the river flow was inadequate for the intended water abstraction.

I want to make it absolutely clear that I believe the issue of a reservoir being built in Wales to primarily serve English cities is definitely something that deserves consideration in the article. Whatever your personal view on the situation, it's obviously a controversy that needs to be considered fairly, and if you must know it's something I'm very sympathetic to. However, what you have changed it to is not appropriate. Firstly, it's a genuine misquote: you have summarised paragraphs (2) and (3) in ordinary brackets, which comes across as though it's part of the quote. Secondly, it's wrong: corporations are not synonymous with their cities (though this is perhaps a minor point). Thirdly, it's not the appropriate place in the article, as it's too lengthy - if it's going to be more extensive, the quote should be moved to a dedicated section in the body with a proper explanation, with a short sentence referring to the controversy in the introductory paragraph. Fourthly, you omit the part that refers to paragraph (5) without even making it clear that words have been omitted.

I think this requires some level of consensus to be found, and have reinstated the previous quote for now (though I have no issue with it being revised so long as it's done properly). I had hoped that including a genuine quote would have cleared this up, but I think this has only made things even more politically charged.

I would also ask you to abide by the Wikipedia principle of assuming good faith. Even if I were trying to misrepresent the situation, it wouldn't make much sense for me to link to the legislation itself or to manually type out the flipping long title above which makes it abundantly clear who this reservoir was designed to benefit. This is the first time I have been involved with this article, too, so there's no need to jump down my throat.

Theknightwho (talk) 20:03, 8 August 2021 (UTC)

@Theknightwho: Why have you put a {{rfc}} tag before a nine-year-old discussion? Why did you not add a neutral, brief statement and timestamp in accordance with WP:RFCST? --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 22:52, 8 August 2021 (UTC)

@Redrose64: Sorry - I missed that! First time. This isn't a 9 year old discussion so much as a discussion that has spanned 9 years. I'll add something now. Theknightwho (talk) 23:23, 8 August 2021 (UTC)

And how are people supposed to separate the comments you are requesting in August 2021 from some ancient stuff from a few editors, not all of whom are still active? What options are you proposing? I can't tell from your "neutral, brief statement" nor from Daicaregos' referral "to the previous cited text" what you're even talking about. And Daicaregos' last edit was more than three years ago. If you want new comments, you should do a new RfC, properly. — JohnFromPinckney (talk / edits) 00:29, 9 August 2021 (UTC)

Ultimately, it's the above discussion that needs resolving as best it can be. This page looks to have been subject to an ongoing back and forth on this issue for almost a decade now, and has become increasingly fraught. At the end of the day, it feels like something that needs unpicking in that context, and I'm not sure I can fairly summarise everything while trying to hive it off into a new discussion. My own suggestion (at least for the moment) is the last comment in the thread before I attempted an RFC. Theknightwho (talk) 00:49, 9 August 2021 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Requested move

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: page moved, uncontroversial, given the article titles found in Category:Reservoirs in Wales and Category:Reservoirs in England. Bencherlite^Talk 22:45, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

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Clywedog reservoir → Clywedog Reservoir – Capitalising the 'r' of reservoir would bring this proper name into line with other reservoir article titles but 'Clywedog Reservoir' is currently a redirect to this page. Geopersona (talk) 06:17, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

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ICE reference

With the assistance of the The Wikipedia Library Card Platform, I have accessed the Institute of Civil Engineers digitised library and found a 2016 paper written by the supervising engineer for the reservoir and the operational manager. The abstract contains the following paragraph:

By the early 1950s, increasing demand for water in the Midlands gave rise to concerns over the long-term sustainability of flows in the River Severn and in particular during periods of dry weather. In 1961, Sir William Halcrow and Partners Ltd was commissioned to review the feasibility of constructing a reservoir to provide storage of 50 000 Ml of water for river regulation. Releases would be made in order to maintain a minimum flow of 720 Ml/d at a control point located at Bewdley in Worcestershire.

This confirms the purpose of the reservoir.  Velella  ^{Velella Talk}   22:49, 10 September 2020 (UTC)

No it does not! It conforms that the river would be used to transfer water to the English Midlands and other English cities. The purpose of a building is not defined by the roofer, the plasterer or the architect, or anyone else. The river is nothing more than a natural pipeline to carry the water to the Midlands. Read the Act, as mentioned above by Theknightwho. If you're correct, then why would this act enable Bristol, Coventry and other English councils to compulsory purchase land in Wales so that the river flows in Summer? What interest would they have had in a river >200 miles away? Answer: because people in these places will use the water! To say that the reservoir was built for the river to keep flowing, rather than to supply water to customers would be not just myopic, but blind ignorance.

Note that the date of the above paper is a 2016; by that time of course, England were very embarrassed for drowning whole valleys in Wales, and have constantly attempted to hide the aison d'être for the ugly deed.

Maybe we need another sentence illustrating the censoring of information on the English Wikipedia, today, and other places. Such bias by @Velella: is pure unadulterated pov!

Tell me Velella, how much is 1+1+1? You, no doubt will answer 2. The third mile takes the water to the horses mouth. Look at the whole picture. Cell Danwydd (talk) 16:10, 7 August 2021 (UTC)