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 Canal
Cottages.
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| The canals required a considerable army of
workers to keep the operating efficiently. Each stretch would
have lengthsmen responsible for simple maintenance tasks, lock
keepers to watch over locks and toll collectors. All these
people needed housing close to their work. Accommodation was
usually simple, such as the toll house on the Llangollen Canal
on the left, but engineers often used stylish flourishes, such
as the circular brick hut opposite the lock cottage at Beeston
on the Shropshire Union Canal right. (Photo right Tony Lewery) |
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Canal
Maintenance Facilities.
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| More complicated maintenance tasks such as
dredging and lock repairs were in the hands of area engineers
and craftspeople based at maintenance yards such as the one at
Icknield Port on the Birmingham Canal System on the left. You
can see the door to the enclosed dry dock area. Smaller dry
docks used for building and maintaining boats, such as the one
at Dutton on the Trent and Mersey Canal on the right, are also
common. The dock entrance is closed off by planks and the dock
drained into a stream to allow the boat hull to be maintained.
(Photo left Tony Lewery) |
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Mills
and other Industrial Buildings
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| Canals were created to serve the needs of the
rapidly developing industrial revolution, and industry continued
to develop alongside the canal system. So industrial buildings
were very common alongside canals, although recent redevelopment
has has often removed many traces, as in the Birmingham area. In
the Potteries alongside the Trent and Mersey Canal you can still
see old bottle kilns, used for firing pottery, as on the left.
Mills, like the one at Cheddleton on the Caldon Canal on the
right, were often using river water for power well before the
canal came to use the river's route. (Photo left Tony Lewery) |
Canal
Warehouses
Wharves and warehouses were necessary to load
and unload and store goods. This might be during transhipment,
either between sea going craft and canal craft, or between
railway and canal, or between canal craft and cart or truck for
local collection or distribution. Many have now been torn down,
but some have been restored to their former glory, such as these
seven storey grain warehouses on Gloucester Docks on the
Gloucester and Sharpness Canal. This one houses the National
Waterways Museum. (Photo Tony Lewery) |
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