| Word |
Meaning |
| aqueduct |
A bridge taking a canal over a river or road. The longest and highest aqueduct in Britain is just outside Shropshire, over the river Dee at Pontcysyllte. There is also a spectacular aqueduct on the Shropshire/Wales border at Chirk. The village of Aqueduct in Telford is named after the aqueduct over the Wellington to Bridgnorth turnpike road on a branch of the Shropshire Canal; this still survives, though it now merely carries a footpath over another footpath.
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| |
| boat |
A boat carries goods or people on a waterway.
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| barge |
Usually means an unpowered boat at least 3.5 metres (12 feet) wide, suitable for broad canals or rivers.
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| narrowboat |
A boat about 2.1 metres (7 feet) wide and 22 metres (72 feet) long, designed to just fit in a lock on a narrow canal. It can carry just over 20 tons of cargo. |
| steam tug |
A tug, powered by steam, used to pull or manoeuvre unpowered boats.
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| trow |
The most common type of boat used on the river Severn up to Ironbridge and Shrewsbury. They were flat-bottomed, relatively wide craft, carrying from 40 to 100 tons. (Pronounced to rhyme with 'crow'.) |
| tub boat |
A special type of boat used on the east Shropshire canals, 6 metres (20 feet) long and 2.0 metres (6 feet) wide. Tub-boats generally carried 3 to 5 tons of cargo, though some extra deep ones could carry up to 8 tons. Two tub-boats are preserved in the Blists Hill Open Air Museum.
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| |
| canal |
A man-made waterway built for boats.
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| broad canal |
A canal built for boats 4.2 metres (14 feet) wide. The canal from Ellesmere Port to Nantwich is a broad canal. |
| feeder |
A channel dug to divert water from a river into a canal. A navigable feeder is one that can be used by boats, as at Llangollen. |
| narrow canal |
A canal built for boats 2.1 metres (7 feet) wide and 22 metres (72 feet) long. All the Shropshire canals which are still use are narrow canals. |
| navigation |
Another name for a canal, but most commonly applied to a river which has been improved by the building of locks and towpaths to make it more suitable for boats. The river Severn was improved from Gloucester up to Stourport (Worcestershire) in the 1840s, but apart from the construction of a towpath in the 1790s it was never improved in Shropshire. |
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| cargo |
Goods carried by a vehicle, such as a boat, cart or train. |
| |
| canal company |
Almost all canals were built by groups of people who paid money to buy shares in a company. Profits were divided according to the number of shares owned. Although this is now the usual way of financing a large business, at the time when the canals were built it was necessary to get a special Act of Parliament to get permission to form a company. |
| subscribers |
People who bought shares in a company, either in the hope of making a good profit or to improve the transport in the area where they owned lands or businesses. |
| merger |
Two or more companies joining together to form a new larger company. |
| |
| cutting |
The removal of earth to enable a canal (or road or railway) to run through an obstacle such as a hill.
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| engineer |
The man who decided the exact route of the canal and where the locks, tunnels, bridges etc were to be, designed them, and supervised the contractors who built the canal. |
| consulting engineer |
The principal engineer who made the most important decisions and acted as the company's expert when it applied to Parliament for its Act. He was usually working on a number of projects at any one time. |
| contractor |
The person who agreed to build a section of the canal for a set price, and who employed and controlled the craftsmen and navvies who actually did the work. |
| navigator |
Short for 'navigator', a labourer who built canals ('navigations'). |
| resident engineer |
The engineer working full time on the particular canal, under the general supervision of the consulting engineer. |
| |
| embankment |
A mound of earth used to raise a canal (or road or railway) above ground level. |
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| inclined plane |
Another method to enable canal boats to go up or down a hill. The boat was pulled up the hill on a trolley on rails. Few canals in Britain had inclined planes, but there were six in the Telford area, one of which is now within Blists Hill Open Air Museum, near Ironbridge. Special small boats called tub-boats were used.
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| lock |
The usual way by which a canal boat goes up or down a hill. A lock is a chamber built of brick or stone, with gates at each end. When a boat wants to go up a lock, the chamber is emptied so that the water level is the same as in the lower canal. The bottom gate is opened, the boat goes in and the gate is closed. Then the lock is filled so that the water level is the same as in the upper canal. The top gate is opened, and the boat can leave.
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| flight of locks |
A number of locks grouped together. There are flights of six locks at Grindley Brook (near Whitchurch), five at Tyrley and Adderley (both near Market Drayton) and four at Welsh Frankton (near Ellesmere), for example. |
| guillotine gates |
These are gates which rise vertically. The Shrewsbury Canal was unusual in having guillotine gates on its locks. Remains of two such locks can be seen in Hadley Park, north Telford. |
| lock gates |
The gates at the end of locks hold the water back. On narrow canals there are usually two gates making a ^ (known as a 'mitre') at the lower end and one gate at the top end. On broad canals the locks have mitre gates at both ends. |
| staircase |
Where the top gates of one lock are also the bottom gates of the lock above. There is a staircase of three locks at Grindley Brook, which causes long queues of boats in summer. There is also a staircase of two locks at Welsh Frankton. |
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| nationalised |
Bought by the government from a company. If something is 'privatised' it is bought by a company or companies from the state. |
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| tunnel |
The way a canal went through a hill, if it could not go round it. The only surviving canal tunnel in Shropshire is near Ellesmere. It is quite short, only 80 metres (87 yards) long.
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| water |
A canal needs a good supply of water, enough to cope with summer droughts. It loses water through leaks and evaporation. Every time a lock is used about 100 to 150 cubic metres of water is lost from the canal above the lock. Water for canals comes either directly from rivers (as from the river Dee at Llangollen) or from reservoirs filled by streams. |
| reservoir |
A man-made lake built to collect water in the winter for use in the summer. There are no canal reservoirs still in use in Shropshire, the best local example being Belvide Reservoir alongside the A5 just over the Staffordshire border. Randlay Pool in Telford was built as a reservoir for the Shropshire Canal. |
| summit level |
The highest level of a canal. It is essential that there is a good supply of water to this level. |
| wharf |
An area by the side of a canal, often with cranes and warehouses, where goods could be loaded and unloaded.
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