Several obstacles remain before the canal restoration can be completed. To join the two navigable sections a new bridge would be needed where the canal is culverted under Commercial Road, and the infilled section to Abergarwed would need to be excavated. The original bridge at Commercial Road is buried beneath the new embankment, and so there is sufficient headroom available through the embankment without major alterations to the road level. Rebuilding of the two Abergarwed locks and Resolven lock would then create a single stretch of canal some long. Extension to the south is blocked by a bridge at water level in Neath, but in 2009 Neath Port Talbot Council commissioned the Prince's Foundation and British Petroleum to investigate options for the regeneration of the Canal Green area, between the river and the railway line, and the proposals suggested that it should be replaced by a lifting or bascule bridge.