Plans to reopen the River Wye through the centre of High Wycombe have been shelved because of the costs – even though councillors acknowledged it has had widespread support.

Bringing the important chalk stream back to the surface after it was buried years ago had got the thumbs up from the High Wycombe Society, who just this month urged Wycombe District Council to “make a commitment to raising our precious river”.

However, councillors decided on Monday night not to put cash towards the project because it was “hard to quantify” the benefits of it in monetary terms, even though they recognised the environmental and health advantages.

Reopening the river through the town centre would likely to have cost around £3 million – but a task group set up to look at whether it could be done said the project was “feasible”.

A cabinet report said that the economic benefits of the project are “not fully proven”, adding: “Cabinet recognises that the proposal would bring some social benefits and considerable environmental benefits, as well as some economic benefits, but not that these justify the remaking of the river at this stage”.

Cllr David Johncock said: “The task and finish group report clearly identifies many of the main potential benefits of opening up the river but the reality is that it is very difficult to determine accurate financial benefits arising from factors such as the general improvement in the environment and the benefits to the health and wellbeing of people living in the area.

“We all know that these are worthwhile and deliverable benefits but they are hard to quantify in purely monetary terms. The financial assessment report suggests there would be a cost-benefit from opening up the river but the payback period was lengthy. We have concluded that there’s not yet a full justified business case for opening up the river.

“We need to take the regeneration strategy and from it, develop detailed proposals for the town centre. In effect, a complete refresh of the town centre masterplan. I say we, but it will actually be the new unitary council who will have to take forward the continued improvement of High Wycombe town centre.”

The decision not to commit cash to reopening the river was supported by Cllr Khalil Ahmed, who said it would be a “mistake” to do it months before the council is abolished in favour of a unitary council.

He said: “Particularly at a time when we are experiencing massive public service cuts, the closure of children’s centres and a lack of youth facilities among the many other hardships caused by austerity. A river would be an attractive and appealing feature in our town but as we have seen with the town centre masterplan, the local authority would need to provide funding to maintain it.”