Trent and Mersey Canal
Template: Infobox River / GKZ_fehlt
Map of the channel ( red) from the time the project stage
The Trent - Mersey canal ( original: Trent and Mersey Canal, symbol: T & M ) is a 150 km long navigable canal in England. It was opened in 1777 and connects the Trent which forms east of Kingston upon Hull with the Ouse the Humber, the North West of England industrial area around Liverpool at the mouth of the Mersey in the Irish Sea. Whether its length and importance it is also called the Great Trunk ( Large master channel ), although it is designed mostly for small boats ( narrowboats ). Just east of Burton -upon -Trent and barges and boats with a width of up to 14 feet can ( 4.27 meters ) travel along the canal.
Course
The canal runs through the regions East Midlands, West Midlands and North West England. The connection to the Mersey via the already opened 1761 Bridgewater Canal, whom he encountered at Preston Brook in Cheshire. The Harecastle tunnel divides the channel into a western and an eastern section.
Western section
The Trent - Mersey Canal at Preston Brook goes on end-to -end in the Bridgewater Canal, the direction in parallel to the Mersey in a northeasterly to Manchester. Just south of the transition he goes through the tunnel of Preston Brook. Here are two additional, shorter tunnel at Saltersford and Barnton. When Anderton near Northwich follows the most remarkable building of the canal, the ship lift at Anderton (English Anderton Boat Lift ), which connects the channel to the River Weaver, which establishes the Shipping on the estuary of the Mersey, is located on the Liverpool.
Next important stop after Anderton is Middlewich, where only 47 meters long branch channel names Wardle Canal connects to the Shropshire Union Canal.
South of Middlewich, the channel raises numerous locks from the Cheshire plains and reaches at Red Bull the summit level. Here branches off a connection channel called Hall Green Branch from the Macclesfield Canal. Then the tunnel of Harecastle follows.
Eastern section
The other end of the tunnel of Harecastle is already in the outskirts of Stoke -on-Trent. The channel now runs through the town. In the district of Etruria, in turn branches off a connecting channel, this leads to the Caldon Canal.
After Etruria the summit level ends at the Lock No. 40 Stoke Top Lock. The channel runs again through rural areas and soon reached the valley of the River Trent.
In Haywood Junction, often called Great Haywood Junction, meets the also built by James Brindley in the context of the Grand Cross plan Staffordshire Worcestershire Canal to the Trent and Mersey Canal. This establishes the connection to the River Severn, the third of the four great rivers.
In Fradley Junction of Coventry Canal branches off, which connects to the same city and some more branches to most of the southern English Channel network.
From Burton -upon -Trent, the channel runs parallel to the Trent. In Swarkestone the Derby Canal was from 1796 to 1817 connected. In Derwent Mouth of the channel ends and the waterway leading to the Trent on.
History
Permission to build the canal in 1766 issued by the British Paralament. After nearly ten years of construction it opened in 1777.
The idea for the Trent and Mersey canal came from the canal engineer James Brindley, the builder of the Bridgewater Canal. He planned the four great rivers of England, Mersey, Trent, Severn and Thames, by navigable canals to connect ( Grand Cross ) with the Trent and Mersey canal should be the backbone (The Grand Trunk ) of this channel network. After Parliament had granted approval in July 1766 groundbreaking ceremony at Middleport. This ground-breaking ceremony led from one of the main promoters of the project, the industrialist Josiah Wedgwood, who hoped the channel a significant improvement in the marketing and delivery options based in Stoke -on-Trent by him in 1759 Wedgwood porcelain factory. Not quite eleven years later the construction of the canal with 76 locks and five tunnels canal was completed.
The competitive behavior of the English Channel societies affected the optimal use of the overall network. The construction of the Derby Canal was trying to prevent the Trent Mersey Kanalgesllschaft. After he was connected in 1796, she rose so high tolls for the transition that he was hardly used and therefore uneconomical for the Derby Canal Company, which is why the connection between the two channels was capped in 1817.
Planned by Brindley himself Harecastle tunnel turned out more and more as a bottleneck. Therefore, a second tunnel was applied in parallel in 1824 under the direction of Thomas Telford.
On January 15, 1847, the railway company North Staffordshire Railway Company until shortly before Founded took over the channel.
Unlike many other channels in the United Kingdom, the Trent and Mersey canal was never shut down. He is, however, now used almost exclusively for recreational purposes, freight traffic no longer takes place. A direct connection to the River Mersey currently no longer exists, however, because the chain of locks, which led to the river from the Bridgewater Canal, was closed down in the 1960s.