Kennet and Avon Canal
The Kennet and Avon Canal is a waterway in southern England with an overall length of, made up of two lengths of navigable river linked by a canal. The name is used to refer to the entire length of the navigation rather than solely to the central canal section. From Bristol to Bath the waterway follows the natural course of the River Avon before the canal links it to the River Kennet at Newbury, and from there to Reading on the River Thames. In all, the waterway incorporates 105 locks.
The two river stretches were made navigable in the early 18th century, and the canal section was constructed between 1794 and 1810. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the canal gradually fell into disuse after the opening of the Great Western Railway. In the latter half of the 20th century the canal was restored in stages, largely by volunteers. After decades of dereliction and much restoration work, it was fully reopened in 1990. The Kennet and Avon Canal has been developed as a popular heritage tourism destination for boating, canoeing, fishing, walking and cycling, and is also important for wildlife conservation.
History
Early plans
The idea of an east-to-west waterway link across southern England was first mentioned in Elizabethan times, between 1558 and 1603, to take advantage of the proximity of tributaries of the rivers Avon and Thames, only apart at their closest. Later, around 1626, Henry Briggs made a survey of the two rivers and noted that the land between them was level and easy to dig. He proposed a canal to connect them, but following his death in 1630 the plan was dropped. After the English Civil War four bills were presented to parliament, but all failed after opposition from gentry, farmers and traders worried about cheaper water transport reducing the value of fees on turnpike roads they controlled, and cheaper produce from Wales undercutting locally produced food.The main alternative to road transport for the carriage of goods between Bristol and London was a hazardous sea route through the English Channel. The small coastal sailing ships of the day were often damaged by Atlantic storms, and risked being attacked by warships of the French Navy and privateers during a succession of conflicts with France.
River navigations
Plans for a waterway were shelved until the early 18th century. However, in 1715, work was authorised to make the River Kennet navigable from Reading to Newbury. Work commenced in 1718, under the supervision of surveyor and engineer John Hore of Newbury. In 1723, despite considerable local opposition, the Kennet Navigation opened, comprising stretches of natural riverbed alternating with of artificially created lock cuts.The River Avon had historically been navigable from Bristol to Bath, but construction of watermills on the river in the early years of the 13th century had forced its closure. In 1727, navigation was restored, with the construction of six locks, again under the supervision of John Hore. The first cargo of "Deal boards, Pig-Lead and Meal" reached Bath in December.
The two river navigations were built independently of one another, in order to meet local needs, but they eventually led to plans to connect them and form a through route.
Closing the gap
Proposals
In 1788, a "Western Canal" was proposed to improve trade and communication links to towns such as Hungerford, Marlborough, Calne, Chippenham and Melksham. The following year the engineers Barns, Simcock and Weston submitted a proposed route for this canal, although there were doubts about the adequacy of the water supply. The name was changed from Western Canal to Kennet and Avon Canal to avoid confusion with the Grand Western Canal, which was being proposed at the same time. This came in the midst of the Canal Mania period, with shares oversubscribed and reports of riotous crowds gathering outside meetings.In 1793, a further survey was conducted by John Rennie, and the route of the canal was altered to take a more southerly course through Great Bedwyn, Devizes, Trowbridge and Newbury. The proposed route was accepted by the Kennet and Avon Canal Company, chaired by Charles Dundas, and the company started to take subscriptions from prospective shareholders. In July 1793, Rennie suggested further alterations to the route, including the construction of a tunnel in the Savernake Forest.
Organisation
On 17 April 1794, the received royal assent and construction began.Responsibility for construction was divided across three committees: the Western District, the central Wiltshire District, and the Eastern District. These awarded contracts and had delegated financial powers. Problems with contractors occurred on multiple occasions, sometimes being overenthusiastic about tendering for multiple sections of work, failing to survey ground conditions thoroughly and encountering difficulties such as rock or natural springs.
Construction began at Bradford-on-Avon in the west, and Newbury in the east, in October 1794.
Western section: Bath to Foxhangers
The first sod for the Kennet and Avon Canal was turned in Bradford-on-Avon, and soon there were wharves above and below Bradford Lock. The canal was complete from Bath to Foxhangers 6.5 years after construction started, in May 1801.Eastern section: Newbury to Devizes
In 1796, completion of the eastern end of the new canal from Newbury to Great Bedwyn was anticipated within 12 months; but by July of that year, inflationary effects of the French Revolutionary Wars led labourers to take up more lucrative harvest work, and 23% of shareholders had fallen into arrears. Water springs encountered between Newbury and Crofton also caused delays.On 12 June 1797, the first section from Newbury to Kintbury was opened, with a band from the 15th Regiment of Dragoons playing aboard the first barge to travel upstream, and chairman Charles Dundas joining the return passage back to Newbury. Construction continued uphill towards Hungerford, where seven houses in the path of the canal were demolished and a new road bridge provided. On 9 October 1798, the first cargo barge arrived in Hungerford, carrying a Portland stone staircase and Russian tallow – about in all. By 2 July 1799, the canal was open as far west as Great Bedwyn. The summit beyond Great Bedwyn, and subsequent gentle descent to Devizes, remained incomplete as late as 1803.
Completion
The final engineering task was the completion of the Caen Hill Locks at Devizes. While the lock flight was under construction, a horse-drawn railway provided a link between Foxhangers at the bottom of the flight and Devizes at the top, the remains of which can be seen under the towpath arches in the road bridges over the canal.The canal opened to through-traffic in 1810, after 16 years of construction. As well as Caen Hill Locks, other major structures included the Dundas and Avoncliff aqueducts, the Bruce Tunnel near Savernake Forest, and the pumping stations at Claverton and Crofton, needed to overcome water supply difficulties.
Operation
In 1801, trade along the canal commenced; goods initially had to be unloaded at Foxhangers at the bottom of what is now Caen Hill Locks, transported up the hill by a horse-drawn tramway, and reloaded into barges at the top. When the flight of locks opened in 1810, allowing the same vessel to navigate the entire canal, the rate of carriage per ton from London to Bath was £2 9s 6d. This compared well with carriage by road, which cost £6 3s to £7 per ton, and trade on the canal flourished. In 1812, the Kennet and Avon Canal Company bought the Kennet Navigation, which stretched from Newbury to the junction with the Thames at Kennet Mouth, near Reading. The purchase from Frederick Page cost £100,000, of which £70,000 was paid in cash with the balance paid back gradually. The purchase was authorised by the , which enabled the company to raise the funds through the sale of 5,500 shares at £24 each. At the same time work was undertaken to improve the Avon Navigation, from Bristol to Bath, with the Kennet and Avon Canal Company purchasing a majority shareholding in the Avon Navigation in 1816.By 1818, seventy 60-ton barges were working on the canal, the majority of the tonnage being coal and stone travelling via the Somerset Coal Canal. The journey from Bath to Newbury took an average of three and a half days. By 1832, 300,000 tons of freight was being carried each year and, between 1825 and 1834, the company had an annual revenue of around £45,000.
A link connecting the Kennet & Avon to the Basingstoke Canal at its Basingstoke terminus – the Berks and Hants Canal – was proposed three times between 1793 and 1810, and a route was even surveyed by John Rennie the Younger in 1824, but following opposition from landowners was eventually rejected by Parliament in 1824 and 1826.
Decline
The opening of the Great Western Railway in 1841 removed much of the canal's traffic, even though the canal company lowered tariffs. In 1852, the railway company took over the canal's operation, levying high tolls at every toll point and reducing the amount spent on maintenance. Ice-breaking was stopped in 1857, and traders were further encouraged by preferential tolls to use the railway rather than the canal. In 1861, a new order prohibited any traffic on the canal at night, and, in 1865, boats were forced to pass through locks in pairs to reduce water loss. By 1868, the annual tonnage had fallen from 360,610 in 1848 to 210,567. In the 1870s, water abstraction from the canal near Fobney Lock followed the regulations introduced in the Reading Local Board Waterworks, Sewerage, Drainage and Improvement Act 1870, and contributed to the silting up of locks and stretches of the canal. Several wharves and stretches of towpath were closed. In 1877, the canal recorded a deficit of £1,920 and never subsequently made any profit.The Somerset Coal Canal and Wilts & Berks Canal, which each supplied some of the trade from the Somerset Coalfield to the Kennet and Avon, closed in 1904 and 1906 respectively. In 1926, following a loss of £18,041 the previous year, the Great Western Railway sought to close the canal by obtaining a Ministry of Transport order, but the move was resisted and the company charged with improving its maintenance of the canal. Cargo trade continued to decline, but a few pleasure boats started to use the canal.
File:Pillbox alongside the canal - geograph.org.uk - 1340793.jpg|thumb|left|A Second World War pillbox near Kintbury
During the Second World War, a large number of concrete pillboxes were built as part of the GHQ Line - Blue to defend against an expected German invasion; many of these are still visible along the banks of the canal. They were generally built close to road and rail bridges, which would have formed important crossing points for enemy troops and vehicles. After the war, the Transport Act 1947 transferred control of the canal to the British Transport Commission, but by the 1950s large sections of the canal had been closed because of poor lock maintenance following a breach in the bank west of the Avoncliff Aqueduct. The last through passage was made in 1951 by nb Queen.