What is this

[gaggle]

Recently talking to an old mate he told me a story he was told many many moons ago when he was a kid , he is now 58 ish.

He was along the cut and he was shown a cast iron grid and inside was a sqaure fitting much like what would be found in a street fire hydrant , he was told that at one time this valve would be turned in the event the canal needed to be lowered or drained in an emergency and that the drained water would be carried down into the dock system via sewer or duct underground.

Dont know if this was original when the canal was built or put in place during the war , anyone shed any light on the story or if such schemes happened elsewhere.

 

 

The dock system that it would drain into is about 800 yrds away.

[gaggle]

Been back down to look at the brickwork below water level and it looks to be the original blue brickwork to about 2 ft deep but the canal would have been deeper than that in the past so if any water intake was there it could be lower.

Myself and the other lad can not find any other features like this along the bootle stretch so it ,whatever it is can only be of use at that location.

looking at old maps for industry types that may have had water extraction point.

[Yoda]

It's a ghostly drain valve. Open it and beware as it will drain the pound in 24 hours.

[gaggle]

Its a twenty odd mile pound , the locks down to the dock system are about 3 miles away and i would think they could drain the canal down them quicker than through a valve.

I will end up down there with a crowbar , have not done that for years ah memories of illicit gains , anyway back to the grid that i will end up forcing open to find what is inside.

 

edit to ask - is it a man called david long who has lots of knowledge relating to this end of L&L.

Edited August 1, 2010 by gaggle

[CanalWalker]

WW2 features usually have rather rubbish concrete around them and are a bit crude, so if it was for the firecrews to get water from the canal I would expect it to look a bit more basic.

 

Maybe Pluto has an idea...

[gaggle]

This looks like a clean cut hole through an original stone block.

the street side of the towpath is piled high now with stone chipping and rubbish so i can not check if anything exits the towpath from that side

the bottom of the wall could be level with the water and the wall to the left is probably the origanal building line of the old warehouses that once lined that side of the street ,1907 map shows woodyards and warehousing in the street bedford place and i dont think the would have needed toextract water from the canal.

Edited August 1, 2010 by gaggle

[buccaneer]

In the 1950's and early 1960's you could still see on some buildings a painted sign on the bricks EWS,it stood for emergency water supply leftover from WW 2

Are there there any bits of paint likethis left in the area?