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New and Improved Canals

Telford carried out a number of surveys of new canals including the Glasgow, Paisley and Johnstone Canal in 1805, the old Grand Union Canal in 1808, the Thames and Medway Canal in 1822, The Macclesfield Canal and the Birmingham and Liverpool Junction Canal. He also surveyed an extension to the Oakham Canal in 1809 and repairs to the Crinan Canal in 1813. Telford also worked on a number of canal improvement schemes. The best-known of these were the Trent and Mersey Canal at Harecastle, the Chester Canal at Beeston and the Birmingham Canals.

An engraving showing a passenger packet boat pulled by two horses with postillion riders near Paisley, on the Paisley Canal in 1849.

Built 1777 by James Brindley, the Trent and Mersey passed through Harecastle Hill, just north of Stoke on Trent, by means of a one and a half mile long, narrow tunnel. By 1820 the tunnel was in a poor condition and in need of extensive repair. The existing design had created a serious bottleneck.

A tunnel tug and battery boat waiting at the Kidsgrove end of Harecastle Tunnel, on the Trent and Mersey Canal, c.1930s. Both Brindley’s and Telford’s entrances can be seen.

Telford was called in to find a solution. He proposed a new tunnel running alongside Brindley’s earlier tunnel including a towpath, thus saving the exhausting occupation of legging boats through the tunnel. The new tunnel opened in 1827. Both tunnels were then in use concurrently until 1914 when mining subsidence caused Brindley’s tunnel to collapse.

Beeston lies on the Chester Canal connecting two sections of the Ellesmere Canal that Telford had worked on earlier in his career. The canal at Beeston was built in an area of running sand and consequently the foundations of the upper lock were unstable. Once again Telford was called in to help and in 1827 he rebuilt the lock with cast iron plates as had been used at Chirk Aqueduct, these can still be seen today.

Beeston Iron Lock on the Shropshire Union Canal,
under repair in 1982. The iron structure of the lock
sides can be seen.