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77-759: The Volga–Baltic Waterway ([Волгобалт] Error: {{Lang}}: invalid parameter: |translit= ( help ) ), formerly known as the Mariinsk Canal System ([Мариинская водная система] Error: {{Lang}}: invalid parameter: |translit= ( help ) ), is a series of canals and rivers in Russia which link the Volga with the Baltic Sea via the Neva . Like the Volga–Don Canal , it connects the biggest lake on Earth,

154-547: A caisson of water in which boats float while being moved between two levels; and inclined planes where a caisson is hauled up a steep railway. To cross a stream, road or valley (where the delay caused by a flight of locks at either side would be unacceptable) the valley can be spanned by a navigable aqueduct – a famous example in Wales is the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct (now a UNESCO World Heritage Site ) across

231-510: A drainage divide atop a ridge , generally requiring an external water source above the highest elevation . The best-known example of such a canal is the Panama Canal . Many canals have been built at elevations, above valleys and other waterways. Canals with sources of water at a higher level can deliver water to a destination such as a city where water is needed. The Roman Empire 's aqueducts were such water supply canals. The term

308-415: A "cistern", or depressed area just downstream from the fall, to "cushion" the water by providing a deep pool for its kinetic energy to be diffused in. Vertical falls work for drops of up to 1.5 m in height, and for discharge of up to 15 cubic meters per second. The transport capacity of pack animals and carts is limited. A mule can carry an eighth-ton [250 pounds (113 kg)] maximum load over

385-496: A canal has a series of dams and locks that create reservoirs of low speed current flow. These reservoirs are referred to as slack water levels , often just called levels . A canal can be called a navigation canal when it parallels a natural river and shares part of the latter's discharges and drainage basin , and leverages its resources by building dams and locks to increase and lengthen its stretches of slack water levels while staying in its valley . A canal can cut across

462-413: A combination of the three, depending on available water and available path: Smaller transportation canals can carry barges or narrowboats , while ship canals allow seagoing ships to travel to an inland port (e.g., Manchester Ship Canal ), or from one sea or ocean to another (e.g., Caledonian Canal , Panama Canal ). At their simplest, canals consist of a trench filled with water. Depending on

539-549: A journey measured in days and weeks, though much more for shorter distances and periods with appropriate rest. Besides, carts need roads. Transport over water is much more efficient and cost-effective for large cargoes. The oldest known canals were irrigation canals, built in Mesopotamia c.  4000 BC , in what is now Iraq . The Indus Valley civilization of ancient India ( c.  3000 BC ) had sophisticated irrigation and storage systems developed, including

616-581: A rather low gradient for its time. The canal is still in use after renovation. In the Middle Ages , water transport was several times cheaper and faster than transport overland. Overland transport by animal drawn conveyances was used around settled areas, but unimproved roads required pack animal trains, usually of mules to carry any degree of mass, and while a mule could carry an eighth ton, it also needed teamsters to tend it and one man could only tend perhaps five mules, meaning overland bulk transport

693-474: A second attempt, the so-called Ivanovsky Canal between Yepifan and Ivan-Ozero , under the administration of Knyaz Matvey Gagarin . However it was too shallow, as it linked the upper Don and the upper Volga via the tributaries Oka River , Upa River , and Shat River in present-day Tula Oblast . Between 1702 and 1707, twenty-four locks were constructed, and in 1707, about 300 ships passed through with difficulty. In 1709 owing to financial difficulties from

770-459: A uniform altitude. Other, generally later, canals took more direct routes requiring the use of various methods to deal with the change in level. Canals have various features to tackle the problem of water supply. In cases, like the Suez Canal, the canal is open to the sea. Where the canal is not at sea level, a number of approaches have been adopted. Taking water from existing rivers or springs

847-422: Is a channel that cuts across a drainage divide , making a navigable channel connecting two different drainage basins . Both navigations and canals use engineered structures to improve navigation: Since they cut across drainage divides, canals are more difficult to construct and often need additional improvements, like viaducts and aqueducts to bridge waters over streams and roads, and ways to keep water in

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924-588: Is a ship canal in Russia . It connects the Volga and the Don at their closest points. Opened in 1952, its length is 101 km (63 mi), 45 km (28 mi) of which is through rivers and reservoirs . The canal forms a part of the Unified Deep Water System of European Russia . Together with the lower Volga and the lower Don, the canal provides the shortest navigable connection between

1001-651: Is also taken from the canal for irrigation. Cargo transported from the Don region to the Volga includes coal from Donetsk in Ukraine , minerals, building materials, and grain. From the Volga to the Don, cargo includes lumber , pyrites , and petroleum products (carried mostly by Volgotanker boats). Tourist cruisers travel in both directions. The canal and the Tsimlyansky water-engineering system (whose chief architect

1078-701: Is presumed, introduced in Italy by Bertola da Novate in the 16th century. This allowed wider gates and also removed the height restriction of guillotine locks . To break out of the limitations caused by river valleys, the first summit level canals were developed with the Grand Canal of China in 581–617 AD whilst in Europe the first, also using single locks, was the Stecknitz Canal in Germany in 1398. In

1155-599: Is rarely less than 30 metres (98 ft) wide. In the 5th century BC, Achaemenid king Xerxes I of Persia ordered the construction of the Xerxes Canal through the base of Mount Athos peninsula, Chalkidiki , northern Greece. It was constructed as part of his preparations for the Second Persian invasion of Greece , a part of the Greco-Persian Wars . It is one of the few monuments left by

1232-418: Is steeper than the desired canal gradient. They are constructed so the falling water's kinetic energy is dissipated in order to prevent it from scouring the bed and sides of the canal. A canal fall is constructed by cut and fill . It may be combined with a regulator, bridge, or other structure to save costs. There are various types of canal falls, based on their shape. One type is the ogee fall, where

1309-452: Is the pound lock , which consists of a chamber within which the water level can be raised or lowered connecting either two pieces of canal at a different level or the canal with a river or the sea. When there is a hill to be climbed, flights of many locks in short succession may be used. Prior to the development of the pound lock in 984 AD in China by Chhaio Wei-Yo and later in Europe in

1386-494: Is the Varverovskoye (Barbarian) Reservoir between locks 9 and 10, 88 m (289 ft) above the Volga and 44 m (144 ft) above the Don river. It uses nine single-chamber canal locks on the Volga slope to raise and lower ships 88 m (289 ft), and four canal locks of the same kind on the Don slope that raise/lower ships 44 m (144 ft) from river height. The locks are smaller overall than those on

1463-839: The Caspian Sea and the world's oceans via the Sea of Azov , the Black Sea , and the Mediterranean Sea . There has been a trade and military route between the Volga and Don rivers since early human history. The presence of the fortified settlement Tanais in the Don River delta since the time of the Bosporan Kingdom , c. 438 BC– 370 AD, strongly suggests the route was sufficiently notable to be fortified for over two thousand years. The Sarkel fortress on

1540-508: The Caspian Sea , to the World Ocean . Its overall length between Cherepovets and Lake Onega is 368 kilometres (229 mi). Originally constructed in the early 19th century, the system was rebuilt for larger vessels in the 1960s, becoming a part of the Unified Deep Water System of European Russia . The original name "Mariinsky" is the credit to Empress Maria Feodorovna , the second wife of Emperor Paul I of Russia . After Peter

1617-658: The Elbe , Oder and Weser being linked by canals. In post-Roman Britain, the first early modern period canal built appears to have been the Exeter Canal , which was surveyed in 1563, and open in 1566. The oldest canal in the European settlements of North America, technically a mill race built for industrial purposes, is Mother Brook between the Boston, Massachusetts neighbourhoods of Dedham and Hyde Park connecting

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1694-686: The Great Northern War , the project was halted. In 1711 Russia left Azov under the terms of the Treaty of the Pruth , and Peter the Great lost all interest in the canal, which was abandoned and fell into ruin. Over time, other projects for connecting the two rivers were proposed, but none were attempted. However, the horse-drawn Dubovsko-Kachalinsky railway and the Volga–Don railway — now part of

1771-543: The Naviglio Grande built between 1127 and 1257 to connect Milan with the river Ticino . The Naviglio Grande is the most important of the lombard " navigli " and the oldest functioning canal in Europe. Later, canals were built in the Netherlands and Flanders to drain the polders and assist transportation of goods and people. Canal building was revived in this age because of commercial expansion from

1848-545: The Phoenix metropolitan area was the most complex in ancient North America. A portion of the ancient canals has been renovated for the Salt River Project and now helps to supply the city's water. The Sinhalese constructed the 87 km (54 mi) Yodha Ela in 459 A.D. as a part of their extensive irrigation network which functioned in a way of a moving reservoir due to its single banking aspect to manage

1925-528: The River Brue at Northover with Glastonbury Abbey , a distance of about 1.75 kilometres (1,900 yd). Its initial purpose is believed to be the transport of building stone for the abbey, but later it was used for delivering produce, including grain, wine and fish, from the abbey's outlying properties. It remained in use until at least the 14th century, but possibly as late as the mid-16th century. More lasting and of more economic impact were canals like

2002-808: The Sheksna River . It then passed Lake Beloye (and Belozersky bypass canal ), Kovzha , its artificial Novomariinsky Canal , the Vytegra to pass through Lake Onega . To or from there vessels sailed through the Onega Canal , the Svir , the Ladoga Canal , and the Neva to or from the Gulf of Finland . In 1829, the Northern Dvina Canal was opened running to the north-east; it connects

2079-614: The Songhai Empire of West Africa, several canals were constructed under Sunni Ali and Askia Muhammad I between Kabara and Timbuktu in the 15th century. These were used primarily for irrigation and transport. Sunni Ali also attempted to construct a canal from the Niger River to Walata to facilitate conquest of the city but his progress was halted when he went to war with the Mossi Kingdoms . Around 1500–1800

2156-544: The South Eastern Railway — were built in 1846 and 1852, respectively, to link the Volga and the Don at the shortest distance. They were 68km and 73km long respectively. The construction of today's Volga–Don Canal, designed by Sergey Zhuk 's Hydroproject Institute, began prior to the Second World War , which interrupted the process. Construction works continued from 1948 to 1952 and the canal

2233-731: The Unified Deep Water Transportation System of the European part of the USSR . The canal begins at the Volga's Sarepta backwater ( 48°31′10″N 44°33′10″E  /  48.51944°N 44.55278°E  / 48.51944; 44.55278  ( start ) , the location of Lock No. 1 and the gateway arch), south of Volgograd . It ends in the Tsimlyansk Reservoir of the Don at the town of Kalach-na-Donu . The canal's highest elevation

2310-572: The Volga Dam , as opposed to the existing Volga–Don Canal that starts south (downstream) of the dam. This would have reduced the number of locks traversed by ships coming from the Volgograd Reservoir, or from other Volga or Kama ports farther north, on their way to the Don. The project was abruptly cancelled to cut expenditure on 1 August 1990, by which time more than 40 percent of its funds had already been spent. Since then most of

2387-576: The Volga–Baltic Waterway , and two other connections. In the 1980s, construction started on a second canal between the rivers. The new canal, dubbed Volga–Don 2 ( Russian : Волго-Дон 2 ; 48°56′37″N 44°30′25″E  /  48.94361°N 44.50694°E  / 48.94361; 44.50694  ( Volgo-Don 2 start ) ) was to have started from the township of Yerzovka on the Volgograd Reservoir , north (upstream) of

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2464-590: The left bank of the lower Don was the main control of this Volga trade route . The Don–Volga portage got its name from its trade importance 1000 years ago. There were several attempts to build a canal to replace the portage after 1500, first by the Ottomans during the 16th century, then by the Russian Empire in the 17th and 18th centuries, and finally, more successfully, by the Soviet Union in

2541-556: The reservoirs built at Girnar in 3000 BC. This is the first time that such planned civil project had taken place in the ancient world. In Egypt , canals date back at least to the time of Pepi I Meryre (reigned 2332–2283 BC), who ordered a canal built to bypass the cataract on the Nile near Aswan . In ancient China , large canals for river transport were established as far back as the Spring and Autumn period (8th–5th centuries BC),

2618-404: The stratum the canal passes through, it may be necessary to line the cut with some form of watertight material such as clay or concrete. When this is done with clay, it is known as puddling . Canals need to be level, and while small irregularities in the lie of the land can be dealt with through cuttings and embankments, for larger deviations other approaches have been adopted. The most common

2695-471: The 12th century. River navigations were improved progressively by the use of single, or flash locks . Taking boats through these used large amounts of water leading to conflicts with watermill owners and to correct this, the pound or chamber lock first appeared, in the 10th century in China and in Europe in 1373 in Vreeswijk , Netherlands. Another important development was the mitre gate , which was, it

2772-472: The 15th century, either flash locks consisting of a single gate were used or ramps, sometimes equipped with rollers, were used to change the level. Flash locks were only practical where there was plenty of water available. Locks use a lot of water, so builders have adopted other approaches for situations where little water is available. These include boat lifts , such as the Falkirk Wheel , which use

2849-531: The 20th. In 1569, the Ottoman Empire attempted to connect the Volga and Don rivers via a canal. The Ottomans wanted to create a maritime link to Central Asia (especially the cities of Bukhara , Khwarazm and Samarkand ) to facilitate trade. Together with a proposed Suez Canal , the Volga–Don canal would also allow Central Asian Muslims to perform pilgrimage to Mecca . According to most historians,

2926-570: The Great wrested the southern and southeastern shore of the Gulf of Finland from Sweden, it made for a great city to secure a means of river transport for Saint Petersburg on the Baltic with the Russian hinterland. These would shift heavy loads in all but the depths of winter. The prototype (via) Vyshny Volochyok canal completed by 1709, provided a connection of Saint Petersburg to Lake Ladoga . The name of that town means "upper portage". However,

3003-889: The Maritime Board ( Morskaya Kollegiya ) of the Russian government, 17.6 million tons of cargo were carried over the Volga–Baltic Waterway in 2004, close to its maximum capacity. The Lower Svir Lock was one of the two busiest locks on Russia's inland waterways (the other one was the Kochetov Lock on the lower Don River ). Canal Canals or artificial waterways are waterways or engineered channels built for drainage management (e.g. flood control and irrigation ) or for conveyancing water transport vehicles (e.g. water taxi ). They carry free, calm surface flow under atmospheric pressure , and can be thought of as artificial rivers . In most cases,

3080-421: The Ottomans managed to dig one-third of the canal before work was abandoned because of adverse weather. Other historians argue that the Ottomans merely leveled the ground so they could haul ships between the two rivers. In the end, the Ottomans retreated from the area and Russia promised to respect trade and pilgrimage routes to Central Asia. Peter the Great ordered the earliest Russian attempts to connect

3157-590: The Persian Empire in Europe . Greek engineers were also among the first to use canal locks , by which they regulated the water flow in the Ancient Suez Canal as early as the 3rd century BC. There was little experience moving bulk loads by carts, while a pack-horse would [i.e. 'could'] carry only an eighth of a ton. On a soft road a horse might be able to draw 5/8ths of a ton. But if

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3234-785: The Southwest by 1300 CE. Archaeologists working at a major archaeological dig in the 1990s in the Tucson Basin, along the Santa Cruz River, identified a culture and people that may have been the ancestors of the Hohokam. This prehistoric group occupied southern Arizona as early as 2000 BCE, and in the Early Agricultural period grew corn, lived year-round in sedentary villages, and developed sophisticated irrigation canals. The large-scale Hohokam irrigation network in

3311-586: The Volga River, but can handle ships of up to 5,000 tonnes cargo capacity . The smallest locks are 145 m (476 ft) long, 17 m (56 ft) wide, and 3.6 m (12 ft) deep. The maximum allowed vessel is 141 m (463 ft) length, 16.8 m (55 ft) beam, and 3.6 m (12 ft) draught (the Volgo–Don Max Class ). The canal is filled from the Don, with three powerful pumping stations to maintain water levels. Water

3388-637: The Volga and Don rivers. After capturing Azov in 1696, he decided to build a canal — later named Petrov Val — on the Ilovlya River (a left tributary of the Don) and the Kamyshinka river (right tributary of the Volga). It was much shorter than the modern canal, connecting a gap of just 4 kilometers (2.5 mi), but was abandoned in 1701 because of a lack of resources and other problems. He initiated

3465-520: The Volga–Don Canal in 2004. An alternative source claims 8.05 million tonnes of cargo was transported through the canal in 2006. Most of the cargo was moved from the east to the west: 7.20 million tonnes, and only 0.85 million tonnes the other way. Just over half of all cargo was oil or oil products (4.14 million tonnes), predominantly shipped from the Caspian region. It was reported in 2007 that in

3542-436: The canal pressure with the influx of water. It was also designed as an elongated reservoir passing through traps creating 66 mini catchments as it flows from Kala Wewa to Thissa Wawa . The canal was not designed for the quick conveying of water from Kala Wewa to Thissa Wawa but to create a mass of water between the two reservoirs, which would in turn provided for agriculture and the use of humans and animals. They also achieved

3619-418: The canal to form a dam. They are generally placed in pre-existing grooves in the canal bank. On more modern canals, "guard locks" or gates were sometimes placed to allow a section of the canal to be quickly closed off, either for maintenance, or to prevent a major loss of water due to a canal breach. A canal fall , or canal drop, is a vertical drop in the canal bed. These are built when the natural ground slope

3696-418: The canal's annual cargo throughput from 16.5 million tonnes to 30 million tonnes. The other option—which had greater support from Kazakhstan , which would be either canal's major customer—was to build the so-called Eurasia Canal along a more southerly route in the Kuma–Manych Depression , some of which is the much-shallower but existing Manych Ship Canal . The southern route would require less earthwork than

3773-462: The canal. Where large amounts of goods are loaded or unloaded such as at the end of a canal, a canal basin may be built. This would normally be a section of water wider than the general canal. In some cases, the canal basins contain wharfs and cranes to assist with movement of goods. When a section of the canal needs to be sealed off so it can be drained for maintenance stop planks are frequently used. These consist of planks of wood placed across

3850-409: The channel. There are two broad types of canal: Historically, canals were of immense importance to commerce and the development, growth and vitality of a civilization. In 1855 the Lehigh Canal carried over 1.2 million tons of anthracite coal; by the 1930s the company which built and operated it for over a century ceased operation. The few canals still in operation in our modern age are a fraction of

3927-399: The drop follows an s-shaped curve to create a smooth transition and reduce turbulence . However, this smooth transition does not dissipate the water's kinetic energy, which leads to heavy scouring. As a result, the canal needs to be reinforced with concrete or masonry to protect it from eroding. Another type of canal fall is the vertical fall, which is "simple and economical". These feature

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4004-412: The first 55 years of the canal's operations 450,000 vessels had passed through carrying 336 million tonnes of cargo. Recent cargo volume stood at 12 million tonnes per year. In 2016, the core of Belarusian nuclear power plant VVER-1200 , which weighed 330 tonnes, was 13 meters high, and 4.5 meters in diameter, was transferred to its destination by exploiting Tsimlyansk Reservoir , the Volga–Don Canal,

4081-440: The first summit level canal to use pound locks in Europe was the Briare Canal connecting the Loire and Seine (1642), followed by the more ambitious Canal du Midi (1683) connecting the Atlantic to the Mediterranean. This included a staircase of 8 locks at Béziers , a 157 metres (515 ft) tunnel, and three major aqueducts. Canal building progressed steadily in Germany in the 17th and 18th centuries with three great rivers,

4158-402: The freedom to make deliveries well away from rail lined road beds or ditches in the dirt which could not operate in the winter. The longest extant canal today, the Grand Canal in northern China, still remains in heavy use, especially the portion south of the Yellow River . It stretches from Beijing to Hangzhou at 1,794 kilometres (1,115 miles). Canals are built in one of three ways, or

4235-537: The higher waters of the Charles River and the mouth of the Neponset River and the sea. It was constructed in 1639 to provide water power for mills. In Russia, the Volga–Baltic Waterway , a nationwide canal system connecting the Baltic Sea and Caspian Sea via the Neva and Volga rivers, was opened in 1718. Volga%E2%80%93Don Canal Lenin Volga–Don Shipping Canal ( Russian : Волго-Донской судоходный канал имени, В. И. Ленина, Volga-Donskoy soudokhodniy kanal imeni V. I. Lenina , abbreviated ВДСК, VDSK )

4312-422: The load were carried by a barge on a waterway, then up to 30 tons could be drawn by the same horse. — technology historian Ronald W. Clark referring to transport realities before the industrial revolution and the Canal age . Hohokam was a society in the North American Southwest in what is now part of Arizona , United States, and Sonora , Mexico. Their irrigation systems supported the largest population in

4389-412: The longest canal in the world today and the oldest extant one. It is 1,794 kilometres (1,115 mi) long and was built to carry the Emperor Yang Guang between Zhuodu ( Beijing ) and Yuhang ( Hangzhou ). The project began in 605 and was completed in 609, although much of the work combined older canals, the oldest section of the canal existing since at least 486 BC. Even in its narrowest urban sections it

4466-419: The longest one of that period being the Hong Gou (Canal of the Wild Geese), which according to the ancient historian Sima Qian connected the old states of Song, Zhang, Chen, Cai, Cao, and Wei. The Caoyun System of canals was essential for imperial taxation, which was largely assessed in kind and involved enormous shipments of rice and other grains. By far the longest canal was the Grand Canal of China , still

4543-405: The lower Sheksna (one of the Volga's tributaries) through Kubenskoye Lake to a canalised Northern Dvina , flowing into the White Sea . The system was further expanded: three more canals, Belozersky, Onezhsky, and Novoladozhsky, enabling smaller craft to bypass dangerous waters of the three big lakes (Beloye, Onega and Ladoga), were inaugurated towards the end of the century. Another connection

4620-557: The new Volga–Baltic Waterway was opened on 5 June 1964. 39 old wooden locks were replaced with 7 new locks, and one parallel lock was built later in 1995. The locks' limiting dimensions are 210 m long, 17.6 m wide and 4.2 m deep, allowing passage of river-sea ships of up to 5000 tons displacement. Such ships were able to sail directly across the big lakes instead of using the bypass canals. Typical travel: Cherepovets to/from Saint Petersburg fell to 2.5–3 days, from 10–15. The modern route sometimes follows

4697-506: The numbers that once fueled and enabled economic growth, indeed were practically a prerequisite to further urbanization and industrialization. For the movement of bulk raw materials such as coal and ores are difficult and marginally affordable without water transport. Such raw materials fueled the industrial developments and new metallurgy resulting of the spiral of increasing mechanization during 17th–20th century, leading to new research disciplines, new industries and economies of scale, raising

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4774-411: The pre-railroad days of the industrial revolution, water transport was the gold standard of fast transportation. The first artificial canal in Western Europe was the Fossa Carolina built at the end of the 8th century under personal supervision of Charlemagne . In Britain, the Glastonbury Canal   is believed to be the first post-Roman canal and was built in the middle of the 10th century to link

4851-423: The route of the old Mariinsk system and sometimes diverges from it. Six of the canal's eight locks are along 35 km of the northern slope, descending 80 metres. Only 2 locks (which are parallel) are on the southern slope, for a rise of 13 metres, near Sheksna on the Sheksna River , 50 km upstream from Cherepovets . The canal route on the northern slope follows the Vytegra flooded riverbed. Thus

4928-480: The standard of living for any industrialized society. Most ship canals today primarily service bulk cargo and large ship transportation industries, whereas the once critical smaller inland waterways conceived and engineered as boat and barge canals have largely been supplanted and filled in, abandoned and left to deteriorate, or kept in service and staffed by state employees, where dams and locks are maintained for flood control or pleasure boating. Their replacement

5005-477: The stone and metal in the abandoned canal and locks has been looted. As of 2007–2008, Russian authorities were considering two options for increasing the throughput of navigable waterways between the Caspian basin and the Black Sea. One option, which reuses the name "Volga–Don 2", is to build a second parallel channel ("second thread") of the Volga–Don Canal, equipped with larger locks 300 metres (980 ft) long. This approach would have allowed for an increase in

5082-402: The summit pound of the canal between Pakhomovo locks on Vytegra and Sheksna Reservoir dam is 278 km. It comprises an artificial canal (40 km long), much of the Kovzha , Lake Beloye , and part of the Sheksna . The route of the southern slope follows the Shekshna , where it parallels the Rybinsk Reservoir . The canal is used for oil and lumber export and for tourism. According to

5159-399: The valley of the River Dee . Another option for dealing with hills is to tunnel through them. An example of this approach is the Harecastle Tunnel on the Trent and Mersey Canal . Tunnels are only practical for smaller canals. Some canals attempted to keep changes in level down to a minimum. These canals known as contour canals would take longer, winding routes, along which the land was

5236-561: The weather on the lake frequently wrecked the barges leading to the ambitious project of the Ladoga Canals into the southern coast of the lake. Under Alexander I of Russia , the waterway through Vychny Volochyok was complemented by the Tikhvin canal system (1811) and the Mariinsk canal system (1810), the latter becoming by far the most popular of the three. The Mariinsk was an outstanding monument of early 19th-century hydrotechnics , which proved to be key to national economic prowess. The system started in Rybinsk and passed through much of

5313-462: Was Leonid Polyakov), form part of an architectural ensemble dedicated to the battles for Tsaritsyn during the Russian Civil War and for Stalingrad during the German-Soviet War . The Russian classical composer Sergei Prokofiev wrote the tone poem The Meeting of the Volga and the Don to celebrate its completion. According to the Maritime Board ( Morskaya Kollegiya ) of the Russian government, 10.9 million tonnes of cargo were carried over

5390-444: Was added in the 1930s, when the infamous White Sea – Baltic Canal was constructed by gulag prisoners at enormous human cost between Lake Onega and the White Sea . Since the 1990s the Volga–Baltic Waterway has grown as a tour boat route to sail and/or motor along or around the Golden Ring of Russia . In 2016, the core of Astravets Nuclear Power Plant , VVER-1200 , which was 330 tonnes, 13 meters high, and 4.5 meters in diameter,

5467-466: Was also expensive, as men expect compensation in the form of wages, room and board. This was because long-haul roads were unpaved, more often than not too narrow for carts, much less wagons, and in poor condition, wending their way through forests, marshy or muddy quagmires as often as unimproved but dry footing. In that era, as today, greater cargoes, especially bulk goods and raw materials , could be transported by ship far more economically than by land; in

5544-458: Was an option in some cases, sometimes supplemented by other methods to deal with seasonal variations in flow. Where such sources were unavailable, reservoirs  – either separate from the canal or built into its course – and back pumping were used to provide the required water. In other cases, water pumped from mines was used to feed the canal. In certain cases, extensive "feeder canals" were built to bring water from sources located far from

5621-470: Was gradual, beginning first in the United States in the mid-1850s where canal shipping was first augmented by, then began being replaced by using much faster , less geographically constrained & limited, and generally cheaper to maintain railways . By the early 1880s, canals which had little ability to economically compete with rail transport, were off the map. In the next couple of decades, coal

5698-424: Was increasingly diminished as the heating fuel of choice by oil, and growth of coal shipments leveled off. Later, after World War I when motor-trucks came into their own, the last small U.S. barge canals saw a steady decline in cargo ton-miles alongside many railways, the flexibility and steep slope climbing capability of lorries taking over cargo hauling increasingly as road networks were improved, and which also had

5775-426: Was once used to describe linear features seen on the surface of Mars , Martian canals , an optical illusion. A navigation is a series of channels that run roughly parallel to the valley and stream bed of an unimproved river. A navigation always shares the drainage basin of the river. A vessel uses the calm parts of the river itself as well as improvements, traversing the same changes in height. A true canal

5852-541: Was opened on 1 June 1952. The canal and its facilities were built by about 900,000 workers including some 100,000 German POWs and 100,000 gulag prisoners. A day spent at the construction yard was counted as three days in prison, which spurred the prisoners to work. Several convicts were even awarded the Order of the Red Banner of Labour upon their release. Upon completion, the Volga–Don Canal became an important link in

5929-582: Was transferred to the plant via the Tsimlyansk Reservoir , the Volga–Don Canal , the Volga–Baltic Waterway, the Volkhov River and a special rail car . In Soviet times, the Mariinsk canal system was constantly improved. Two locks were built on the Svir River (in 1936 and 1952); 3 locks were built on the Sheksna River . Major improvement of the Volga–Baltic Waterway took place in 1960–1964, and

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