By the mid-1980s commercial traffic had largely come to a halt with the canal being given over to pleasure cruisers with the exception of a few passages by grain barges. The oil trade ceased in 1985 with the closure of the petroleum depot at Quedgeley. In order to allow the A430 Gloucester southwestern bypass to be built the canal had to be diverted. This new cut eliminated a major problem which had plagued commercial traffic since opening: the sharp double bend in the canal. The new section of channel was opened on 6 May 2006. In January 2009 a project began to replace the Patch Bridge swing bridge with a motor powered design instead of the former hand-cranked system.