Pluto

I suspect that the canal Act gives boats legal precedence at swing bridges, though it is not mentioned specifically in the Byelaws. On road bridges, it was required that the bridge be shut after the boat passed. Handcocks Bridge at Aintree was often left open when the canal was first in use, and Lord Derby complained that he had been held up because the bridge was left open. The canal company then installed a bridge keeper to ensure that the bridge was shut after boats passed, the name of the keeper being Handcock, and hence the present name for the bridge. I think that the closure of this bridge would be arranged legally by the police during Grand National week, but at other bridges the canal has priority.

Old boatmen up here on the L&LC told me just to get a bucket of small coal and keep chucking pieces in front of the bow. You then follow the splashes.

There are significant differences in the design of a sailing coble to that of a motor coble, and it is the latter which are still being built.

That's me on the other side of the plaque to Barry.

No, it's two locks which are now out of use. The two locks at Poolstock replaced them because coal mining subsidence has affected the whole area between Worsley and Wigan, with the ground 30 feet lower than when the canal was built. There was a lock at Plank Lane as well, and I can remember the remains of one of the boats used for filling the bottom of the canal to reduce water pressure on the embankment sides which was sunk in the basin at Plank Lane. In one place nearer to Wigan you can look down onto a former canal basin now separated from canal by ten feet vertically.

On the L&LC, in areas where there had been mining subsidence, movement of the chamber stonework made it very difficult for the carpenters to balance a gate properly so it would stay either open or closed. To ensure that the gates stayed where required, iron bars were fitted under the balance beam. These could be swung down to hold the gate in place. Perhaps, now that there are so few canal carpenters who understand how to hang a gate properly, such bars should be introduced more widely.

I certainly remember helping to remove some of the concrete. IIRC, it was when we were taking a B&MCC butty to the national rally at Northampton.

The Leeds & Liverpool Canal is still fed by the same number of reservoirs as it was at the beginning of the 20th century. You may be thinking of the Rochdale and Huddersfield Narrow Canals, which have seen a reduction in reservoir numbers, so why did they keep open and the L&LC close last year?

Obviously, rainfall does have an effect, but there should not have been a need to close the canal at such an early stage last year had there been a little more care early in the year. On the number of boats, the current number passing locks over the summit is about the same as when the canal was in greatest use, just before the 1st W W. However, there were ten times more using the canal lower down, with water having to be fed down from the summit to feed this water usage. If you think that 1.5 million tons were carried annually between Liverpool and Wigan, this equates to 30,000 loaded boats annually, or 82 per day, making seven every two hours throughout every day of the year, and that without considering boats returning empty.

The number of boats using the canal today, ie passing through locks, is around a tenth of those that used to use the canal around 1914, so a few extra hire boats will not have any appreciable effect on the water supply. Lack of water today is the result of a decline in maintenance which started after the First World War, when canals generally were not repaid for the damage done during the war. Unfortunately, the decline in maintenance standards is still continuing.

Natural heritage seems to be rather well represented, with built heritage getting none. It suggests that they will not be well informed regarding the conservation of the built heritage, which is probably the key requirement for any body overlooking what BW, or its successor, does.

Good to see that the panel doesn't have anyone with long-term canal experience.

It's not quite as simple as this, although cost was a major factor as English canals were usually built with private money, rather than public. Other factors to be considered included water supply, though this would have been virtually the same for equal tonnages whether the locks were wide or narrow. One other important factor was what traffic was expected to be carried; wide boats were certainly able to carry larger individual packages, and was it better to have a wide boat such that cargoes could be delivered to coastal areas without transshipment. The Duke of Bridgewater was certainly in favour of a narrow T&MC as that ensured canal cargoes were transshipped between narrow boats and his flats for delivery to and from Liverpool. The extra cost of the transshipment could certainly make the additional cost of a wide canal more acceptable. The difference in cost between the two was certainly much less than the four times you quote, even for tunnel building, with Rennie's cost for a wide or narrow Rochdale Canal being £350,000 compared to £290,000.

No, vandals set fire to the hull at Ellesmere Port in the mid-1980s, which at least shamed the local authority into providing some security fencing at the Boat Museum. What upset me most was not the loss of the hull, several people here can tell you of the problems of maintaining an old wooden L&LC boat, which is much more difficult than maintaining a wooden narrow boat, but the cabin in Pluto was the last surviving one still as built and painted by a traditional boatyard. The paintwork was last done in the 1950s. Other surviving wooden L&LC boats had had their cabins removed to improve access for hull maintenance.

From the drawings I have for L&LC gates, at Greenberfield and Barrowford each gate was 10 feet 5 inches at the top, narrowing to 10 feet 2 inches at the bottom. Lock widths as reported circa 1920 (possibly for the earlier Royal Commission) varied from 14 feet 8 inches at the top of Bingley 3-rise to 15 feet 8 inches at the bottom of Wigan, 16 feet at Liverpool and 17 feet at Tarleton. The story of gates being removed from the north west to Saul is pretty definite, and I seem to remember seeing something in paperwork of the time when looking through archive material. The 1960s were a time when canal finances were being reviewed, with standard steel lock gates dating from then, and they were introduced to keep costs down on smaller waterways. Possible variations in mitre angle first came to my attention around fifteen years ago, when the lock gate workshop at Stanley Ferry had an open day, with gates for the L&LC and C&HN being displayed next to each other. The latter are much smaller, framework timber dimensions being perhaps 2 inch less all round.

I have always understood that these gates came from the Rufford Branch in the 1960s, when there was no direct money for the Stroudwater. An old pair of L&LC gatse, in need of refurbishment, were sent to the south west where they were made to fit. Rufford locks are between 15 feet and 16 feet wide, with Tarleton Lock over 17 feet wide. Any slight variation in width between L&LC and Sroudwater (nominally 15 feet 6 inches) could easily be overcome, particularly if the mitre angle was different. The L&LC gates have a much sharper mitre angle than the C&HN, for example. The other location for sourcing recycled gates would have been Tewitfield Locks on the Lancaster, which were cascaded around then.

Canal boat, and hence lock, size was usually based on the local river or estuary boat then in use. In the north west, these were around 68 feet long and perhaps 15 feet wide, though the more up river boats were narrower. In the north east, around 60 feet was the standard length, with 14 feet being the width in the early eighteenth century. The Bridgewater was initially built for 68 feet long wide boats with a rudder length of up to four feet. The Worsley mine boats were initially similar in length, but half the width, though by the end of the eighteenth century there were at least six different sizes for the mine boats, depending upon how far into the mine they worked. 68 feet plus 4 feet or rudder gives 72 feet, and that is what was used for the T&MC, with the width being halved to reduce building costs. Over the years, some lock sides have moved slightly, so a boat 6 feet 10 inches wide should not have too much difficulty anywhere.

Ten years ago I had to write a report on the length of inland waterways in Britain at ten year intervals from 1700. From this, I was able to compile figures for broad and narrow canals. The total figures were 1952 miles of broad canal, 1539 miles of river navigation (broad), and just 1257 miles of narrow canal.

When the new road aqueduct was built in the late 1960s or early 70s, in order to maintain navigation there were two inclines, one on either side of the aqueduct, joined by a railway, so boats could be pulled out of the canal on a cradle, traverse the works on the railway, and then be returned into the canal on the opposite side of the stoppage.

That is certainly one long term aim, but in the shorter term they are very aware that their own boats need work as money and time becomes available. The L&LCS is in discussion with them over the possibility of the yard undertaking the conservation work required on the former BW heritage boat Kennet, which the canal society now look after. Kennet will be at Saltaire from 15-18 April for World Heritage Day - this year's theme is water, and then will then be at the Skipton Waterway Festival over the Mayday bank holiday weekend, returning to Saltaire for their Arts event 28-30 May. The next Kennet event could be a heritage weekend at Burscough in June/July, with Kennet going on dock for a survey and minor hull repairs later in the summer.