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The idea of a canal linking the Grand Union Canal (or Grand Junction as it was then) to the River Great Ouse at Bedford goes back as far as 1811 when John Rennie was asked to survey the route, the idea resurfaced in the 1840s and again in 1892 but was always opposed and no building work was done.
In 1994 Brian Young, a member of the IWA Cambridge Branch, founded the Bedford & Milton Keynes Waterway Trust www.b-mkwaterway.org.uk and a scheme was produced that found widespread support and was shortlisted as a Millennium Commission project. Unfortunately local funding could not be found at the time and the bid failed but Brian Young persisted with the scheme right up to his sudden death in 2000.
Shortly before Brian died in 2000 British Waterways supported the plan for a Bedford & Milton Keynes Waterway and a project partnership www.b-mkproject.net was formed to promote the waterway. A feasibility study was commisioned that identified three posible routes at the Milton Keynes end of the waterway, a further three routes at the Bedford end and a short central section that was common to all routes.
The financial case for the waterway is based on the multiple use of the route for recreation, water supply, cable route, navigation and on its value for waterside development projects.
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