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Weston Marsh Lock, Weaver Navigation closed UFN


frangar

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20 minutes ago, MoominPapa said:

I think it's for information on doing the whole length of the ship canal: bypassing the Middlewich breach by going from Ellesmere port on the Shroppie to Pomona lock which takes you back onto the Bridgewater in Manchester, and thence via Preston Brook to the T&M.

 

MP.

 

I guess I am missing the geography up there, but the closing statement is 10 hours from Salterhouse dock in Liverpool, would they not have had to cross the Mersey as well as doing the MSC?  All looks good though, I need to do this.

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4 hours ago, graemejwalker said:

Message from The Danny:

 

"Hi I believe the lock is now inoperable but they are maybe going to look at Weston point docks as an alternative but this may not happen straight away. You had best contact CRT"

Please help, I am totally confused. Have been looking at Google Earth and trying to find out about tides on the Manchester ship canal from Google, but can't find anything. Marsh Lock is a conventional pound lock and we lock up onto the Weaver because the Weaver is higher, but the lock at Weston Point looks to be a "tidal lock" with only one gate so could only open when the Weaver and Ship canal are at the same level. How does this happen? At some tides does the Mersey come over the Weaver Sluices and raise the ship canal (all the way down to Eastham) ? If it raises too much on very high tides then this would "reverse" Marsh lock????? Am I missing something????

 

If the Weston Point route does become available whilst Marsh is broken then it might be very nice to do it, a sort of unique opportunity.

 

................Dave

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18 minutes ago, dmr said:

Please help, I am totally confused. Have been looking at Google Earth and trying to find out about tides on the Manchester ship canal from Google, but can't find anything. Marsh Lock is a conventional pound lock and we lock up onto the Weaver because the Weaver is higher, but the lock at Weston Point looks to be a "tidal lock" with only one gate so could only open when the Weaver and Ship canal are at the same level. How does this happen? At some tides does the Mersey come over the Weaver Sluices and raise the ship canal (all the way down to Eastham) ? If it raises too much on very high tides then this would "reverse" Marsh lock????? Am I missing something????

 

If the Weston Point route does become available whilst Marsh is broken then it might be very nice to do it, a sort of unique opportunity.

 

................Dave

Got to say, I was wondering the same thing

 

G

 

 

 

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30 minutes ago, dmr said:

Please help, I am totally confused. Have been looking at Google Earth and trying to find out about tides on the Manchester ship canal from Google, but can't find anything. Marsh Lock is a conventional pound lock and we lock up onto the Weaver because the Weaver is higher, but the lock at Weston Point looks to be a "tidal lock" with only one gate so could only open when the Weaver and Ship canal are at the same level. How does this happen? At some tides does the Mersey come over the Weaver Sluices and raise the ship canal (all the way down to Eastham) ? If it raises too much on very high tides then this would "reverse" Marsh lock????? Am I missing something????

 

If the Weston Point route does become available whilst Marsh is broken then it might be very nice to do it, a sort of unique opportunity.

 

................Dave

From wandering around there, I think the lock in question is not the one that goes out at an angle to the ship canal, but the one with a road bridge over which goes to further docks. If you follow along, you'll find that those docks are open to the ship canal. On Google Earth, you can't see the gates, but there is something maintaining a level difference under the movable road bridge. It all looked VERY disused a couple of years back. 

 

MP.

 

ETA, to be clear. One of the docks has gates at one end to the ship canal and at the other to the Weaver Navigation, so can presumably by used as a large lock by altering the level in the whole dock.

Edited by MoominPapa
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20 minutes ago, MoominPapa said:

From wandering around there, I think the lock in question is not the one that goes out at an angle to the ship canal, but the one with a road bridge over which goes to further docks. If you follow along, you'll find that those docks are open to the ship canal. On Google Earth, you can't see the gates, but there is something maintaining a level difference under the movable road bridge. It all looked VERY disused a couple of years back. 

 

MP.

 

Looking at both Google Earth and Canalplan, there are two locks (beyond Marsh) connecting the Weaver to the ship canal and both look to be "single gate" locks. First is Delamere lock, and a bit further on is "River Mersey Tide Lock" and on GoogleEarth its gates are open. Maybe Google took their picture at a suitable high tide????, but your theory that there is something else "blocking" or maintaining a level on the Weaver would make sense. But I can't spot anything on Google Earth, wish we'd paid more attention when we boated down there a few weeks ago. Am really struggling to understand all this stuff. Did the canal beyond the old disused lock (now the terminus of the Weaver) ever join up with the Runcorn Locks?????   Recently explored the Runcorn Locks (on foot!) which was interesting.

 

If there is something maintaining the level then who owns it and as you say, is it in working order?????

 

.................Dave

Edited by dmr
compurt rebellion
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24 minutes ago, MoominPapa said:

 

 

ETA, to be clear. One of the docks has gates at one end to the ship canal and at the other to the Weaver Navigation, so can presumably by used as a large lock by altering the level in the whole dock.

Thank you, yes, I can see them, just by the old Christ Church, that makes that whole dock one huge lock! is there something similar by the first bridge? cant really see anything on Google Earth.

 

Suspect that fixing Marsh Lock is the only way to go and this is all a distraction......or maybe a clever plot to re-open a new bit of waterway????

 

.................Dave

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2 hours ago, tom_c said:

How about reopening frodsham lock? that would be a nice alternative route

Tom 

That would be great but looks like a bit of a project. If you follow the link in Richards post you can see a couple of "ships" moored at Frodsham and I spotted these from the A56 so the lower Weaver is navigable. This is surprising for as we approached Marsh lock I did look up the Weaver mouth and there was quite a lot of reed type stuff growing in the water so I had assumed it was very silted.

 

..............Dave

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9 minutes ago, RLWP said:

We had a good explore of Runcorn and St Helens over the winter but I still struggle to understand the navigation and history. Maybe I should join the Weaver society. The lock leads to a disused length of canal, a bit of which still exists. I had assumed that the plan to restore Runcorn locks was going to link up with this to make a Runcorn-Weaver cruising ring but in fact the Runcorn plan is to link into the Manchester ship canal which is less good as Eastham to Runcorn is quite busy. There is also a tiny bit of another old canal further on at Wigg Island which was obliterated when the ship canal was built.

 

..............Dave 

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59 minutes ago, dmr said:

We had a good explore of Runcorn and St Helens over the winter but I still struggle to understand the navigation and history. Maybe I should join the Weaver society. The lock leads to a disused length of canal, a bit of which still exists. I had assumed that the plan to restore Runcorn locks was going to link up with this to make a Runcorn-Weaver cruising ring but in fact the Runcorn plan is to link into the Manchester ship canal which is less good as Eastham to Runcorn is quite busy. There is also a tiny bit of another old canal further on at Wigg Island which was obliterated when the ship canal was built.

 

..............Dave 

It's the stub of the Runcorn and Weston canal:

 

http://maps.nls.uk/geo/explore/#zoom=15&lat=53.3370&lon=-2.7408&layers=1&b=1

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23 hours ago, MoominPapa said:

From wandering around there, I think the lock in question is not the one that goes out at an angle to the ship canal, but the one with a road bridge over which goes to further docks. If you follow along, you'll find that those docks are open to the ship canal. On Google Earth, you can't see the gates, but there is something maintaining a level difference under the movable road bridge. It all looked VERY disused a couple of years back. 

 

MP.

 

ETA, to be clear. One of the docks has gates at one end to the ship canal and at the other to the Weaver Navigation, so can presumably by used as a large lock by altering the level in the whole dock.

The lock looked very derelict in 2014:

 

 

D2A5676E-C98B-4310-AA31-D652325D8614.jpeg

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12 hours ago, RLWP said:

There's a little article about it on Wikipedia, filled in in the 1960's. Its quite depressing that a lot of canals were lost within my lifetime.

 

.............Dave

10 hours ago, Tim Lewis said:

The lock looked very derelict in 2014:

 

 

D2A5676E-C98B-4310-AA31-D652325D8614.jpeg

I didn't spot these on Goggle Earth but thought I could see the gate recesses, I will look again. Maybe they have now gone and stop planks put in.  I don't imagine the dock could be used routinely as a lock, it would take forever to fill, fixing Marsh Lock is the only real option.

 

...............Dave

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The Daniel Adamson has been freed from the lock as went past us ( at Rock Savage) going up stream on Wednesday & has just passed us going downstream with a school party on board, it wasn’t long before they were back going upstream.

They were loading & unloading at Sutton Weaver service point, before the swing bridge.

284CEAA2-2DF5-4464-A5DB-5B7DBD4F67EB.jpeg

E2D1D6EA-6963-4D24-8515-3D3A6CC0FFEF.jpeg

3F6A1600-629D-4CB1-A75E-BA91E2273080.jpeg

  • Greenie 1
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1 hour ago, Jamboat said:

The Daniel Adamson has been freed from the lock as went past us ( at Rock Savage) going up stream on Wednesday & has just passed us going downstream with a school party on board, it wasn’t long before they were back going upstream.

So the busted top gates are at least open-able. It's quite possible that they can't be closed, or won't make a seal, of course.

 

MP.

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

i used to work at Weston Point as the Customs Officer when it was a busy B.W. port. We had 14 ships " in charge "from foreign ports" in dock between Runcorn and Weston on one day in the late 1970s. Sad to see it as a land storage depot rather than an "inter Model Hub" that Eddie Stobart publicised when they took the lease from BW but things change. I have passed through with a boat twice from the Weaver that way some years back, there used to be two electrically operated swing bridges to get through to the outer basin. Just before the lower swing bridge is the inner basin gate holding the Weaver level back. You passed through to the outer basin and the inner gates closed then they ran down the level, took about one hour to make a level with the MSC,. The outer gates the opened onto the MSC.   This was a daily occurrence depending on shipping.  The outer gate to the basin was always closed after traffic as a safeguard to the Weaver levels otherwise everything was on one gate which was seen as unsafe  ( as it is now). When the lessee  took the lease from BW people told me ( hearsay, towpath talk, could be wrong , just what I heard,) that the lease said that they must maintain the navigation for boats to and from the Weaver at 24 hours notice from BW if required due to Marsh Lock problems. Soon after the lovely hexagonal lock keeper huts ala BCN at the locks were flattened and the outer lock gates to the outer basin were seen to be back and the outer basin was at MSC level allowing silt in from the MSC.  Nothing has gone that way for it is said 12 years now . Maintenance as per lease, couldn't  possibly say  ??? 

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  • 2 weeks later...

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