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43-646: The Shropshire Union Canal Society is an organisation formed to promote interest in and enhance the Shropshire Union Canal system, in England and Wales. The Shrewsbury & Newport Canal Association was formed in December 1964, with the ambition of restoring to navigation the canals between Norbury Junction and Shrewsbury. A report had appeared in a local newspaper in September, indicating that

86-487: A brake van . A 70 metres (230 ft) section of northern bank of the canal failed on 16 March 2018 at an aqueduct over the River Wheelock , near Middlewich , leaving 15 to 20 boats stranded on a 1.3 kilometres (0.81 mi) stretch between Wardle Lock and Stanthorne Lock. One boat close to the 12 metres (39 ft) deep hole had to be evacuated, and minor damage to one local's garden was recorded. According to

129-415: A chain of immense fortresses: Prince's, George's, Salt-House, Clarence, Brunswick, Trafalgar, King's, Queen's, and many more. It is a region, this seven-mile sequence of granite-lipped lagoons, which is invested ... with some conspicuous properties of romance; and yet its romance is never of just that quality one might perhaps expect ... Neither of the land nor of the sea, but possessing both the stability of

172-635: A condition for not opposing the construction of a newer one). The link with the Staffs and Worcester provides a choice of onward journeys: The Shropshire Union Railways and Canal Company was formed in 1846. The Ellesmere and Chester canals had amalgamated in 1813, and the absorption of the Birmingham and Liverpool Junction Canal by the Ellesmere and Chester Company was authorised by an Act of Parliament passed in 1845. A further Act, passed in 1846, changed

215-401: A succession of granite-rimmed docks, completely inclosed, and many of them communicating, which almost recalled to mind the great American chain of lakes: Ontario, Erie, St. Clair, Huron, Michigan, and Superior. The extent and solidity of these structures, seemed equal to what I had read of the old Pyramids of Egypt... For miles you may walk along that river-side, passing dock after dock, like

258-521: Is also home to one of the largest cruise terminals in the UK which handles approximately 200,000 passengers and over 100 cruise ships each year. The port has significant links to North America and the rest of Europe via the Irish Sea and Atlantic Ocean . It is the most significant port in the UK for transatlantic trade . The port's history spans over 800 years and at its peak in the 19th century, it

301-402: Is equipped with flood gates at both ends to prevent loss of water should the canal be breached in this area. During World War II these locks were kept closed at night because of the risk of bomb damage. At Gnosall the canal enters the 81-yard (74 m) Cowley Tunnel. Originally the tunnel was planned to be 690 yards (630 m) long, but after the rocky first 81 yards (74 m), the ground

344-545: Is in Coburg Dock and has 340 berths. Cruise ships once sailed from Langton Dock , part of the enclosed north docks system. Departures and arrivals were subject to tides. Cruise ships returned to Liverpool's Pier Head in 2008, berthing at a newly constructed cruise terminal , enabling departures and arrivals at any time. Until 2012, any cruises beginning in Liverpool still departed from Langton Dock but, since 2012,

387-413: Is the biggest port ... there was something to see from Dingle up to Bootle, and as far again as Birkenhead on the other side. Yellow water, bellowing steam ferries, white trans-atlantic liners, towers, cranes, stevedores, skiffs, shipyards, trains, smoke, chaos, hooting, ringing, hammering, puffing, the ruptured bellies of the ships, the stench of horses, the sweat, urine, and waste from all the continents of

430-891: The British Waterways Board intended to drain part of the Newport Branch of the Shrewsbury Canal , which had been closed since 1944. The Association was formed in response to a suggestion from the North-Western branch of the Inland Waterways Association that a local society was needed to campaign for restoration. In 1966 the Ministry of Transport rejected the restoration proposals, the Association changed its name to

473-579: The RMS ; Titanic . Most of the smaller south end docks were closed in 1971 with Brunswick Dock remaining until closure in 1975. Many docks have been filled in to create land for buildings: at the Pier Head , an arena at Kings Dock , commercial estates at Toxteth and Harrington Docks and housing at Herculaneum Dock . In the north, some branch docks have been filled in to create land. Sandon and Wellington Docks have been filled in and are now

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516-629: The Shropshire Union Railways and Canal Company . The main line between Nantwich and Autherley Junction was almost built as a railway although eventually it was decided to construct it as a waterway. The canal starts from Ellesmere Port on the River Mersey traversing the Wirral peninsula to Chester . This stretch, which was completed in 1797, was originally part of the unfinished Ellesmere Canal . The industrial waterway

559-527: The Staffordshire village of Knighton . There is an aqueduct south of Norbury Junction and deep cuttings at Loynton near Woodseaves (Staffordshire) and Grub Street . The canal then continues as the 1-mile-long (1.6 km) Shelmore Embankment. Repeated soil slippage during construction meant that this was the last part of the B&;L Junction Canal to be opened to traffic. The lengthy embankment

602-658: The Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal ) the SU is part of an important circular and rural holiday route called the Four Counties Ring . The SU main line was the last trunk narrow canal route to be built in England. It was not completed until 1835 and was the last major civil engineering accomplishment of Thomas Telford . The name "Shropshire Union" comes from the amalgamation of the various component companies ( Ellesmere Canal , Birmingham and Liverpool Junction Canal , Montgomeryshire Canal ) that came together to form

645-699: The Canal and River Trust, the breach was caused by a member of the public leaving open a paddle gate on a lock, allowing water into the section of the canal, and causing it to overflow. After emergency repairs costing £3 million, the Middlewich branch of the canal reopened on 21 December 2018. To promote the interest in, use of, and restoration of parts of the Shropshire Union Canal, the Shropshire Union Canal Society

688-731: The Cheshire Plain by means of a flight of 15 locks at Audlem . The canal passes through the eastern suburbs of the town of Market Drayton in Shropshire. The canal then passes through Tyrley Locks and enters the Woodseaves Cutting (named after Woodseaves (Shropshire) but also known as Tyrley Canal Cutting), the longest cutting on any canal in Britain. It is about 2.7 km long and up to about 21.3m deep. Further south there are substantial lengths of embankment through

731-600: The Chester Canal, to the Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal at Autherley Junction, near Wolverhampton. An important lost link can be seen at Norbury Junction , where a branch (1841) ran south-west through Newport to connect with the Shrewsbury Canal at Wappenshall Junction . After Nantwich basin, a long sweeping embankment incorporating an aqueduct carries the canal across the main A534 Nantwich-Chester road. The canal then has to climb out of

774-487: The Liverpool bank of the River Mersey. From 1830 onwards, most of the building stone was granite from Kirkmabreck near Creetown , Scotland. The interconnected dock system was the most advanced port system in the world. The docks enabled ship movements within the dock system 24 hours a day, isolated from the high River Mersey tides. Parts of the system were a World Heritage Site from 2004 until 2021. From 1885,

817-889: The River Mersey to the Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal at Autherley Junction in Wolverhampton. Other links are to the Llangollen Canal (at Hurleston Junction ), the Middlewich Branch (at Barbridge Junction ), which itself connects via the Wardle Canal with the Trent and Mersey Canal , and the River Dee (in Chester ). With two connections to the Trent and Mersey (via the Middlewich Branch and

860-603: The Shropshire Union (SU) system and lie partially in Wales . The canal lies in the counties of Staffordshire , Shropshire and Cheshire in the north-west English Midlands . It links the canal system of the West Midlands , at Wolverhampton , with the River Mersey and Manchester Ship Canal at Ellesmere Port , Cheshire, 66 miles (106 km) distant. The "SU main line" runs southeast from Ellesmere Port on

903-580: The Shropshire Union Canal Society and two years later, in 1968, set out to restore the Montgomery Canal . This United Kingdom canal-related article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Shropshire Union Canal The Shropshire Union Canal , sometimes nicknamed the " Shroppie ", is a navigable canal in England. The Llangollen and Montgomery canals are the modern names of branches of

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946-511: The bank of the Llangollen branch of the canal failed near Sun Bank Halt , Denbighshire . Escaping water washed away a 40-yard (37 m) section of the trackbed of the Ruabon to Barmouth railway line . A Great Western Railway mail and freight train was derailed, killing one person and injuring two others. The train's consist was entirely destroyed in the ensuing fire, with the exception of

989-414: The dock system was the hub of a hydraulic power network that stretched beyond the docks. Both White Star Line and Cunard Line were based at the port. It was also the home port of many great ships, including RMS  Baltic , RMS  Olympic , RMS  Mauretania , RMS  Aquitania and the ill-starred Tayleur , MV  Derbyshire , HMHS  Britannic , RMS  Lusitania , and

1032-709: The docks to the south of the Pier Head are operated by the Canal ;& River Trust , the successor to former operator British Waterways . Liverpool's first dock was the world's first enclosed commercial dock, the Old Dock , built in 1715. The Lyver Pool, a tidal inlet in the narrows of the estuary, which is now largely under the Liverpool One shopping centre, was converted into the enclosed dock. Further docks were added and eventually all were interconnected by lock gates, extending 7.5 miles (12.1 km) along

1075-498: The docks, using diesel locomotives. The first rail link to the docks was the construction of the 1830 Park Lane railway goods station opposite the Queen's Dock in the south of the city. The terminal was accessed via the 1.26 mi (2.03 km) Wapping Tunnel from Edge Hill rail junction in the east of the city. The station was demolished in 1972. The tunnel is still intact. Until 1971, Liverpool Riverside railway station served

1118-671: The east side of the River Mersey and the Birkenhead Docks between Birkenhead and Wallasey on the west side of the river. In 2023, the Port of Liverpool was the UK’s fourth busiest container port, handling around 900,000 TEUs of cargo each year, equivalent to over 30 million tonnes of freight per annum. It handles a wide variety of cargo, including containers, bulk cargoes such as coal, grain and animal feed, and roll-on/roll-off cargoes such as cars, trucks and recycled metals. The port

1161-425: The junction is a very shallow stop lock built to prevent the loss of water to the new rival canal from the preexisting Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal . Unusually, the B&L Junction canal's summit level was designed to be a few inches lower than the older canal, so the newer canal gains a small amount of water each time the lock is cycled (the reverse of the practice usually insisted on by canal companies as

1204-545: The liner terminal at the Pier Head. Today, for passengers disembarking from the new cruise terminal , city centre circular buses call at the terminal directly, while Moorfields and James Street are the nearest Merseyrail stations. On the opposite side of the river, the Birkenhead Dock Branch served the docks between 1847 and 1993. This route remains intact, albeit disused. For more than six weeks,

1247-428: The location of a sewage works. Most of Hornby Dock was filled in to allow Gladstone Dock 's coal terminal to expand. The largest dock on the dock network, Seaforth Dock , was opened in 1972 and deals with grain and containers, accommodating what were the largest containers ships at that time. In 1972, Canadian Pacific unit CP Ships was the last transatlantic line to operate from Liverpool. Liverpool Freeport Zone

1290-721: The name of the company to the Shropshire Union Railways and Canal Company and authorised the acquisition of the Shrewsbury Canal and other canals in the east Shropshire network (linking modern-day Telford with the River Severn to the south at Coalport ). Then (in 1847), the latter was taken over by the London and North Western Railway Company, which allowed the Shrewsbury Canal and the branch from Norbury Junction to decline. On 7 September 1945,

1333-552: The northern Wirral section was joined to the pre-existing Chester Canal ; eventually becoming part of the network Shropshire Union. Although the Ellesmere Canal was not completed as intended, the central section of the Ellesmere Canal was built. These sections now form part of the waterways: Llangollen Canal and Montgomery Canal . Both are actually branches of the Shropshire Union mainline, although in modern times they are considered to be separate canals. In Chester, from

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1376-504: The one and the constant flux of the other—too immense, too filled with the vastness of the outer, to carry any sense of human handicraft—this strange territory of the Docks seems, indeed, to form a kind of fifth element, a place charged with daemonic issues and daemonic silences, where men move like puzzled slaves, fretting under orders they cannot understand, fumbling with great forces that have long passed out of their control ... ...Liverpool

1419-454: The original terminus of the Chester Canal. The two junctions on this stretch are very important links in the English and Welsh connected network. The odd angle between Nantwich basin and the next stretch of the SU shows that the journey southwards is on a newer (and narrow) canal originally constructed as the narrow Birmingham and Liverpool Junction Canal to connect Nantwich, at the end of

1462-541: The ship Highlander lay in Prince's Dock; and during that time, besides making observations upon things immediately around me, I made sundry excursions to the neighbouring docks, for I never tired of admiring them. Previous to this, having only seen the miserable wooden wharves, and slip-shod, shambling piers of New York, the sight of these mighty docks filled my young mind with wonder and delight... In Liverpool, I beheld long China walls of masonry; vast piers of stone; and

1505-531: The terminal has been used as the start and end of voyages, and not merely a stop-off point. This led to a dispute with Southampton due to the large public subsidy provided for the new terminal, which Liverpool City Council has agreed to repay. Ships which have called at Liverpool Cruise Terminal include Queen Elizabeth 2 (QE2), Grand Princess , Caribbean Princess and RMS Queen Mary 2 . A number of large Royal Navy vessels, such as HMS  Illustrious and HMS  Ark Royal , have also visited

1548-650: The terminal. At one point the Mersey Docks and Harbour Company freight railway totalled 104 mi (167 km) of rail track, with connections to many other railways. A section of freight rail line ran under the Liverpool Overhead passenger railway , with trains constantly crossing the Dock Road from the docks into the freight terminals. Today, only the Canada Dock branch line is used to serve

1591-467: The top of the arm leading down to the Dee, the SU follows the old Chester Canal built in 1772 to connect Chester and Nantwich. The canal passes alongside the city walls of Chester in a deep, vertical red sandstone cutting. After Chester, there are only a few locks as the canal crosses the nearly flat Chester Plain, passes Beeston Castle, and the junctions at Barbridge and Hurleston and arrives at Nantwich basin,

1634-407: The world ... And if I heaped up words for another half an hour, I wouldn't achieve the full number, confusion and expanse which is called Liverpool. ...Old photographs and even the print of Liverpool Docks as seen from the overhead railway would fail to convey the powerful reality of the Port of Liverpool in the 1950s. This was at the time when every berth had a ship alongside, vessels were waiting off

1677-592: Was formed. Today their main restoration activities are on the Montgomery Canal , which is slowly being restored into Wales. The canal in Chester is promoted by Chester Canal Heritage Trust . 53°17′N 2°53′W  /  53.283°N 2.883°W  / 53.283; -2.883 Port of Liverpool The Port of Liverpool is the enclosed 7.5-mile (12.1 km) dock system that runs from Brunswick Dock in Liverpool to Seaforth Dock , Seaforth , on

1720-552: Was intended to connect the Port of Liverpool on the River Mersey to the River Severn at Shrewsbury via the North East Wales Coalfields . However, only eight years after the completion of the contour canal between Netherpool and Chester, the proposed project became uneconomical. This meant the planned 16-mile (26 km) mainline from Chester to Trevor Basin near Wrexham was never constructed. Instead

1763-765: Was opened in the North Docks 1984, expanding to include some of the Birkenhead Dock system in 1992. The Euro Rail terminal was established at Seaforth Dock in 1994 and the port expanded five years later, including construction of the Liverpool Intermodal Freeport Terminal. In 2004 UNESCO announced Liverpool Maritime Mercantile City . In 2020 Liverpool was the United Kingdom's fourth largest port by tonnage of freight, handling 31.1 million tonnes. Liverpool Marina

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1806-474: Was the second most important port in the British Empire . In 2016, the port was extended by the building of an in-river container terminal at Seaforth Dock, named Liverpool2 . The terminal can berth two 14,000 container Post-Panamax ships. Garston Docks , which are in the city of Liverpool, are not a part of the Port of Liverpool. The working docks are operated by Mersey Docks and Harbour Company ,

1849-559: Was unstable, and the remaining length was opened out to form the present narrow and steep-sided Cowley Cutting. At Wheaton Aston, the canal climbs its last lock to reach the summit level, fed by the Belvide Reservoir just north of Brewood . North of the reservoir, the canal passes by Stretton Aqueduct over Watling Street (the A5 road ). The SU terminates at Autherley Junction on the Staffs and Worcester Canal. Immediately before

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