£7.3m mains replacement work between Weston and Ilkley underway

Yorkshire Water is underway with a £7.3m project to replace 18.8km of water mains between Weston and Ilkley, to improve reliability of drinking water supply, reduce leakage, and prevent water main bursts in the area. 

The project, which began this month, will see contract partners United Infrastructure replacing over 18km of mains pipework on local streets by the end of the summer.  

Nichola Fairbairn, project manager at Yorkshire Water, said: “We are undertaking a huge upgrade to our clean water infrastructure, having already replaced over 120km of water mains across Yorkshire since the start of our investment period in April 2025 – estimated to be saving 1.24 million litres of leakage every day.  

“The scheme between Ilkley and Weston is one of our larger mains replacement projects and will provide significant benefit to the local areas. With bursts and potential loss of supply much less likely, we’ll be delivering the quality and reliability of service that our customers rightly expect.” 

The work is part of Yorkshire Water’s £8.3bn investment into Yorkshire over the next five years, which includes a £406m investment in replacing more than 1,000km of water mains across the region. 
 
Local residents have been contacted in regard to any localised disruption. 

Nichola added: “We’ll be working quickly and doing everything that we can to keep disruption to the community to a minimum whilst we deliver this important work – and thank everyone in the area for their patience in advance.”