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On this day in 2007spacer.png

 

spacer.pngNew bridge

 

Calcutt Marina GU

 

Inspired by the graceful lines of the Horseley Ironworks bridges, espescially their understated manufacturer's name cast unobtrusively into the structure

 

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Edited by PeterScott
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On this day in 2020

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spacer.pngWatersports Centre

Forth and Clyde Canal Port Dundas Branch

 

Compare

#2412 (1986)

#2548   #3757 (2017)

 

Pinkston Basin Glasgow  spacer.png

 

 ... connected to the rest of the Forth and Clyde  Canal by going down ...

 

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... Craighall Road Lock  ...

 

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...along the Speaker Martin section at the lower level ... (some not-too-popular moorings here)

 

 

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... and up Spiers Wharf Lock ,

aka Speaker Martin's Lock

 

to Speirs Wharf

 

Compare

#4061 (1977)

#2412 (1986)

#2538 (2011)

 

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Edited by PeterScott
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On 26/02/2021 at 23:12, John Liley said:

Many thanks indeed. That is certainly something to chew on. My friends who went to see him found Mr Pownall at home in Wimbledon, still declaring that his scheme would one day have to be adopted, in the interest of water supply. Apart from that, they had nothing more to say about him. Andrew Denny of 'Waterways World' kindly sent be a copy of his thesis, which takes a particular example of what could be done, up beside the higher reaches of the Leeds & Liverpool Canal, on the Lancashire side. I have to confess it made his proposal of a tunnel in that area daunting: It would rival, no, overshadow, HS2.

 

To get UK governments interested at all seems beyond unlikely, although Boris Johnson (who else?) referred to the Pownall scheme in his  days as London's mayor, though how serious he was one can only imagine. Should the Manchester Ship Canal and the Aire & Calder together become major arteries of trade, then a case could begin to be made. But not in my lifetime, I fear

 

A major handicap to an expansion of the English canal system for freight is the lack of knowledge of what has developed, and continues to develop, in nearby mainland Europe. Do those who run the Inland Waterways Association, for example, ever go there? They should.

 

My thanks agin, all the same. I shall keep  the idea of a book on this with others bumbling about in my brain

I did put together the attached text (pdf) in 2000, which gives a bit more context to canal proposals in the late 19th and 20th centuries. The IWA did/does have a freight transport section who were quite active. One problem in promoting water-bourne transport is that the government statistics lumped it in with coastal shipping. I remember talking to a professor of transport in Berlin who was amazed to hear that at that time, circa 2000, the A&CN was carrying around 2 million tons annually, albeit fairly short haul. Some of the Dutch canals were happy to carry half of this.

Proposed lifts.pdf

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2 hours ago, PeterScott said:

On this day in 2014

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Aylesbury Circus Field Basin

 

 

At that stage we were yet to navigate the Aylesbury Arm. We had purchased her a year earlier from another kiwi couple, and had the handover briefing alongside a hospital bed in Wellington. We arrived in the UK about five days before the great Aylesbury boat escape by road to Bletchley from the old Aylesbury basin. In September we made the reverse voyage by road but instead to Circus field where we had a pleasant 10 days exploring Aylesbury and even a day excursion by train to London awaiting our flight home.

 

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