Canals in Britain

By Tony Conder

In the early years of the Industrial Revolution, canals formed the arteries of Britain. Most waterways were local concerns, carrying cargoes over short distances and fitted into regional groups with their own boat types linked to the major river estuaries. This new history of Britain's canals starts with the first Roman waterways, moving on to their golden age in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, and ends with the present day, describing the rise and fall of canal building and use in the UK. It tells the story of the narrow boats and barges borne by the canals, and the boatmen who navigated them as well as the wider tale of waterway development through the progress of civil engineering. Replete with beautiful photographs, this a complete guide to some of the most accessible and beautiful pieces of Britain's heritage.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
• Release date: Apr 20, 2017
• ISBN: 9781784421076

Tony Conder

Tony Conder has been involved with inland waterways since his parents first took him for walks beside the Wey Navigation. For twenty-five years he was Curator of the British Waterways Collection. Initially he was based at Stoke Bruerne, from where he collected objects from all over the canal system. In 1988 he opened the National Waterways Museum at Gloucester and in 1999 became Curator to the Waterways Trust, taking the collection to national designated status.

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INTRODUCTION

Today, Britain’s waterways are generally a tranquil, green environment largely cut off from industry. With clean water they are often havens for wildlife, and their towpaths offer a green ribbon into the heart of cities and towns. Some areas have been redeveloped, with housing around docks and wharves, but much of the landscape remains as it has been for years. Museums and interpretation centres on the waterways help us to make sense of centuries of waterway history, and some of the original buildings and historic boats have been preserved.

The National Waterways Museum, Ellesmere Port, incorporates a range of waterways from narrow to the biggest and has an excellent boat collection.

The first canals were raw scars across the landscape 250 years ago, dug to link coal mines and quarries to factories, and seaports to inland towns. They helped turn Britain from a largely agricultural nation into an industrial powerhouse ahead of the rest of the world.

The canal age, when waterways were virtually unchallenged as an inland transport network, was relatively short, lasting perhaps eighty years; in many cases less. However, most canals have a history of over 200 years and navigable rivers were first improved over 400 years ago.

What may look on a map like a designed network of waterways was actually a series of smaller initiatives built to join local industry to local raw materials. Many Acts of Parliament were created for canals between 10 and 15 miles long. The Leeds to Liverpool Canal was an exception: at 125 miles, it was the longest built.

Waterway development started with improvements to rivers and moved on to canal building. The first major project of the waterway age was the Aire and Calder Navigation, the first part of which opened in 1701, linking Leeds to the River Ouse and the sea at Hull. Built by merchants for merchants, its success would promote the benefits of waterway transport for generations to come.

The Canal Museum, Stoke Bruerne, where you can explore the locks and walk to Blisworth Tunnel.

In the Midlands the first canals were independent waterways, begun between 1766 and 1769 but opening at different dates. They linked to one another and via the rivers to the great estuaries, so that through them the Midlands could connect to the sea. These early canals would make a fortune for their investors and owners.

The Grand Junction Canal was planned through the village of Stoke Brewen, as it was then known, in 1793.

In the north the success of the Aire and Calder was followed by the promotion of the canal from Leeds to Liverpool, which would link all the industries and resources of the region. A network of broad waterways stretched into coalfields and to the growing manufacturing towns.

Stoke Bruerne in horse boating days in the 1920s: a pair of boats head south.

Many of the Midlands canals were built to small dimensions. The boats on them could carry much less than the barges trading around the country on the river navigations. There were rival broad canal schemes suggested in opposition to the narrow canals. On the Trent and Mersey canal, for instance, a wide canal linking the rivers Trent, Severn and Weaver failed to gain the political and financial support required, and the narrow canal was built. The smaller canals were seen to be affordable and a practical solution, while the general benefits of canals were still being evaluated. There was no overall plan to produce a national transport system.

The Gloucester Waterways Museum at the heart of the docks tells the story of the Severn and its waterways.

The size of the narrow canals would be one factor in the long-term failure of waterways. It meant that only a maximum of around 27 tons could be carried by a crew of two or three people. This was fine for the early days of industrialisation, but no competition for railway freight trains or trucks when they came on the scene. Despite years of discussion most of Britain’s waterways never moved to a barge standard where hundreds of tons could be carried economically.

Leeds quickly became a huge city, thanks to the industrial growth supported by the Aire and Calder Navigation.

There was also no standardisation; lock lengths and widths even varied between narrow waterways. Where the narrow canals met the broad canals, 70-foot-long narrowboats could not pass through 60-foot-long locks designed for shorter