Shrewsbury Canal

One of Telford's first tasks was to build Longdon-on-Tern Aqueduct as a rebuild of a stone aqueduct over the River Tern at Longdon-on-Tern which had been built by Clowes but swept away by floods in February 1795.[7] Telford's stonemason instincts initially led him to consider replacing the original structure with another stone-built aqueduct, but the heavy involvement of iron-masters in the Shrewsbury Canal Company, notably William Reynolds, led him to reconsider. Instead, it was rebuilt using a 62-yard (57 m) cast iron trough cast in sections at Reynolds' Ketley ironworks and bolted together in 1796. The main trough was 7 ft 6 in (2.29 m) wide and 4 ft 6 in (1.37 m) deep, with a narrower trough to one side which formed the towpath.[7] The aqueduct was the world's first large-scale iron navigable aqueduct, though it was narrowly predated by a much smaller 44-foot-long (13 m) structure on the Derby Canal built by Benjamin Outram. The aqueduct still stands today, though it is isolated in the middle of a field. This successful use of an iron trough to contain the water of a navigable aqueduct casts the Tern aqueduct in the role of Telford's prototype for the much longer Pontcysyllte Aqueduct on the Llangollen Canal,[7] where he mounted the iron trough on high masonry arches.

The Shrewsbury Canal was finally finished in 1797, being 17 miles (27 km) long, with 11 locks. At Trench an inclined plane was built, which was 223 yards (204 m) long and raised boats 75 feet (23 m) up to the Wombridge Canal, from where they could travel via the Shropshire Canal southwards to the River Severn at Coalport. The plane consisted of twin railway tracks, each of which held a cradle. Boats would be floated onto the cradles, which had larger wheels at the back to keep the boat level. A third set of wheels were mounted at the front, which ran on extra rails in the dock, to prevent the cradle tipping forwards as it ran over the top cill. The plane opened in 1794, and although it was partially counterbalanced, with loaded boats going down the plane pulling empty boats up, a steam engine was also provided, to pull the boats over the top cill.[8] This and the rails were provided by Reynolds' Coalbrookdale Company. In 1840 the rails were replaced with edge rails, allowing the use of conventional flanged wheels on the cradles, and the engine was replaced in 1842, with a high pressure Cornish engine, again ordered from the Coalbrookdale Company. The plane continued to be used until 1921, making it the last operational plane in Britain.[9]

The canal in Newport

The canal included a 970-yard (890 m) tunnel at Berwick, which was 10 feet (3.0 m) wide, but included a wooden towpath, supported by bearers which were attached to the wall.[6] Clowes designed the tunnel, but the addition of a towpath was suggested by Reynolds.[10] The towpath lasted until 1819, when it was removed.[11] By 1904, there was a white line painted in the middle of the tunnel, and if boats travelling in opposite directions met in the tunnel, the one which had passed the mark had right of way.[12]

The canal was originally built as a narrow canal intended for horse-drawn trains of tub boats which were 20 feet (6.1 m) long and no wider than 6 ft 4 in (1.93 m). However, in preparation for the Newport branch of the Birmingham and Liverpool Junction Canal to Wappenshall the section from there to Shrewsbury was surveyed in 1831 and subsequently widened to take standard 7-foot (2.1 m) narrow boats.[13] The costs of widening the bridge holes and the Eyton locks proved to be expensive, and plans to widen the section from Wappenshall to Trench were abandoned.[14] With the opening of the Newport Branch in 1835, the Shrewsbury Canal was no longer isolated from the rest of the national canal network. This heralded the canal's most profitable period, though it was short-lived.[13] The branch linked Norbury Junction to Wappenshall Junction, passing through Newport, and included 23 locks.

In 1844 the Humber Arm was constructed. This short branch ran to Lubstree Wharf, which was owned by the Duke of Sutherland. Tramways ran from the end of the branch to various works owned by the Lilleshall Company, who shipped cargoes of pig iron, coal and limestone for use as a flux in the production of iron. Much of this trade had previously used the Donnington Wood Canal, but the new arm provided a more direct connection to the canal network, and the transfer of trade was a factor in the closure of the Donnington Wood Canal.[15]

Most of the traffic on the canal was coal, bound for Shrewsbury. Tolls were charged at 1+1⁄2d per ton per mile, with an extra 1d to use the inclined plane. This was high, compared to other canals, and the rate was reduced to 1d per ton per mile in 1797, while Reynolds was allowed to ship iron and other commodities toll-free for a time. However, in 1799, the company raised the tolls to 2d. This led to some discontent, with the local newspaper complaining that rather than reducing the price of coal, the townspeople were paying two to three shillings more per ton than before the canal had been built. The enterprise was prosperous, with dividends on the £125 shares rising to £8 in 1805, £10 in 1823 and £11 in 1929. Immediately after the opening of the Newport branch, they reached £16, but were back to £10 by 1843.[10] The coal producers complained about the tolls in 1843, but the canal company argued that they were charging too much for the coal, and lower tolls would not improve the situation. However, tolls were reduced to 1+1⁄2d in 1844, and the producers reduced the price of coal by 2s 6d.[16]

In May 1845, the amalgamation of the Birmingham and Liverpool Junction Canal and the Ellesmere and Chester Canal was authorised by an Act of Parliament, and there were schemes to build railways throughout the area that they served. The railway engineer Robert Stephenson held a meeting on 24 July, at which he proposed further amalgamation of canal and railway interests, in order to make the task of obtaining authorising acts easier. In addition to the enlarged Ellesmere and Chester Canal, the Shropshire Union Railways and Canal Company would absorb the Montgomeryshire Canal, the Shrewsbury Canal and the Shropshire Canal. While many miles of waterway would be replaced by railway, some 80 to 90 miles (130–140 km) would be retained in water, which included the Ellesmere Port to Middlewich via Burbridge Junction section, the Shropshire Canal and the Shrewsbury Canal. Three Acts of Parliament were obtained in 1846, to enable railway construction, and extra clauses enabled the name change to the Shropshire Union to be made, and the acquisition of the Shrewsbury Canal. At the time there were 500 shares in the Shrewsbury Canal, on which holders had paid £125, and these were valued at £150 each, which valued the canal at £75,000.[17]

The first railway to be constructed was the Stafford to Shrewsbury Line, as it could be built quickly, and would be a great asset to the area. It was also stated that "its construction will not involve the loss of any revenue from the canals." Realignments of various railway companies resulted in the formation of the London and North Western Railway Company (LNWR) on 1 January 1846, and they saw the Shropshire Union scheme as a threat. They therefore offered to lease the Shropshire Union in late 1846, and an Act to authorise this was obtained in June 1847. Conditions of the lease, which was not fully completed until 25 March 1857, meant that the Shropshire Union dropped all plans for further railway expansion, but they were given a free hand to run the canals as they saw fit.[18] However, Robert Skey, the canal manager, when he addressed a meeting in September 1861, noted that the carriage of general merchandise had suffered, as it had gradually transferred to the railways.[19]

In 1870, a plan to reduce the costs of maintaining the Trench incline resulted in the company leasing Lubstree wharf from the third Duke of Sutherland. A new railway was built from the wharf to the Lilleshall Company works, and a wharfage charge of one halfpenny per ton for coal and other merchandise was agreed. The Shropshire Union set aside 30 boats to cope with the traffic,[20] and in 1878 tolls for iron ore from Ellesmere Port to Lubstree were reduced, but by 1880, the only traffic on the Humber Arm was fluxing stone. In order to improve its use, the Shropshire Union agreed rates for carrying 300 to 400 tons of limestone and 100 to 150 tons of iron ore per week, and these measures were successful, as a further railway siding was built when the lease was renewed in 1891, and it was renewed for a further 14 years in 1905. Longdon-on-Tern Aqueduct was in a poor state of repair by 1899, when the company looked at closing the canal from Eyton to Shrewsbury, but the legal difficulties of a railway company closing a canal meant that it stayed open.[21]

In its later years, the Trench incline had only carried grain upwards to Donnington Wood mill, and the incline was closed on 31 August 1921.[22] In 1922, the London, Midland and Scottish Railway (LMS) took over the canal and the basin in Shrewsbury was closed.[23] This action saved the cost of replacing the swing bridge at the basin entrance. Traffic on the Humber Arm ended in 1922, when the fifth Duke of Sutherland closed the wharf and the railway line to Lilleshall. No traffic used the canal to Shrewsbury after 1936, and a further section beyond Comet bridge was abandoned in 1939. Small volumes of coal were still reaching Longdon in 1939, and just 100 tons per year were recorded on the Newport Branch in 1943. The LMS finally abandoned the canal network in 1944, when they obtained an Act of Abandonment. The Shrewsbury Canal was just a small part of the 175 miles (282 km) abandoned under the 1944 Act.[22] Following the transfer of responsibility for the canal network to British Waterways in 1963, much of the route of the canal was sold to local landowners.[24]