Canals & Rivers

Canals and Rivers

Considering the pre nineteen seventies Lancashire the most significant waterway was the River Mersey, which formed the border with Cheshire to the south. Looking at modern Lancashire, there are still a number of navigable waterways that allow people to get around the county. These include:

River Ribble (navigable)
River Douglas (navigable)
Ribble Link (navigable)
Lancaster Canal (part navigable)
Leeds & Liverpool Canal (navigable)

Lancaster Canal

The Lancaster Canal started life in the late eighteenth century. It was originally split into tow sections. One was to the south of the River Ribble, and this originally went from Wigan to the south of Preston. It was later adopted as part of the Leeds & Liverpool Canal. The northern section went from Preston to Kendal. This section spent the majority of its life in isolation from the national waterway network. It was connected via the Ribble Link, relatively recently, in 2002. That allowed it to develop its own unique character. The two sections where once connected by a horse drawn tramway that predated the railways.

The History of the Lancaster Canal

Promoted by wealthy local merchants in the late 18th century, the Lancaster Canal was originally envisaged as a line from the Bridgewater Canal at Worsley through to Kendal. The plans were modified several times, and unfortunately the route never became one continuous waterway. The final incarnation, as seen today, has lost some sections from Chorley to Walton Summit (south of Preston). They were cut through by the creation of the M61 Motorway in the 1960s. Because of this, the Lancaster Canal bears little resemblance to the original proposals.

FAREWELL TO THE SUMMIT
The following text is taken from a 1968 publication entitled " FAREWELL TO THE SUMMIT " that was given to me by a friend who has a mutual interest in Canal related history. It was written by Ian Moss to accompany a visit to the Southern section of the Lancaster Canal towards Walton Summit and the adjoining Tram Road to Preston. At the time, both were in a state of disuse, but were much more visible than today. At the time of the visit, the construction of the M61 Motorway was underway, and this highway cut through the canal. Thus, putting it out of action forever...

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

My accounts of the local area - About this Blog

The Hidden Viaduct of the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway

The Hidden Viaduct of the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway The Old Railway Line On a personal level, I am familiar with the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway, or at least the disused sections around Preston and South Ribble. I used to cross a section near Bamber Bridge on may way to school in the mid nineteen-seventies, and I am sure that there were still a few goods trains pulling loads of oil tankers crossing Brownedge Road (Brownedge Lane) that occasionally stopped us if I'd gone to school on the 113 bus. Passenger services had long since stopped and when the goods trains had also ceased, the rail company ('British Rail') quite quickly removed the infrastructure. This was definitely the rails and sleepers, but perhaps not the ballast straight away. From that point forward, it became the playground of a few of the local children, myself included. Brownedge Level Crossing, Bamber Bridge around 1905 At that point, we often would have adventures in the remains of T...

Fall Of Thirteen Arches of the Ribble Viaduct on the Preston Extension of the East Lancashire Railway.

Fall Of Thirteen Arches, of the Ribble Viaduct on the Preston Extension of the East Lancashire Railway. Following on from my post about the Hidden Viaduct near Preston, once know as "The Blue Bridge", I put the old picture looking from Miller Park and my photograph of the top of a buried arch on a local social media group. That solicited a comment from a group member that pointed towards an old news article. Hidden Viaduct near Preston, once know as "The Blue Bridge" This news article revealed that there had been problems with the arches during the construction, and this actually led to thirteen of them collapsing. It was entitled "Fall of Thirteen Arches of the Ribble Viaduct on the Preston Extension of the East Lancashire Railway". It came from the Preston Guardian published on Saturday 27th October 1849. I ran the scanned image of the newspaper extract through an online OCR (optical character recognition) software process and converted the image in...

Crosby Blitz Beach - Remains from the city of Liverpool before World War II

Crosby Blitz Beach How did I get here? In January 2023, I discovered the remains of an old building on the banks of the River Ribble in Penwortham. I was intrigued. It wasn't until December 2023 that I discovered what it was. A member of the Preston Past and Present Facebook group posted some pictures with the description, "Preston Town Hall 1862-1947 R.I.P. built by George Gilbert Scott." I found it fascinating, so I went back for another look in early 2024. You can read about it here: The Remains of Preston's Third Town Hall - https://www.mylancs.uk/2024/02/the-remains-of-prestons-third-town-hall.html More recently, I was watching YouTube videos, and went on a journey through some recommendations (thanks to the YouTube algorithms). On this particular evening, I started with a video about building developments around Liverpool City Centre. It was created by a gentleman called Aidan, who goes by the handle of AidanEyewitn...

The Delph in the River Ribble by Avenham Park

The Delph in the River Ribble by Avenham Park Over the years, I have always been slightly confused when people mention the the necessity of 'divers' when investigating things in the River Ribble by Avenham Park, adjacent to the Old Tram Road bridge. However, after being momentarily perplexed by it, my train of thought often moved onto something else. More recently, when researching the history of the Lancaster Canal, I was led to an account of divers (again) fishing something out of the River Ribble in the same location. This time, I decided to figure out why they would be needed. The answer is that there is a significantly deep 'Delph' in the River Ribble. Strangely, whilst I thought that word was generally part of everyone's vocabulary, it turn out not to be. I didn't pop up in online dictionaries when I did a web search. Relatively locally, I have had conversations with people about 'Eccy Delph' (Eccleston Delph). It turns out that Delph ...

My Lancashire - My accounts of the local area

Search This Blog