From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Neath and Tennant Canal
The exit from the newly restored Clun Isaf lock
Original Owner	Neath Canal Nav Co, Port Tennant Nav Co
Principal Engineer	Thomas Dadford
Other Engineer(s)	George Tennant
Date of Act	1791
Date of first use	1795
Date Completed	1824
Date Closed	1930s
Date Restored	1990 onwards
Maximum Boat Length	60 ft 0 in (18.29 m)
Maximum Boat Beam	9 ft 0 in (2.74 m)
Start Point	Glynneath
End Point	Briton Ferry / Swansea Docks
Locks	15 (originally 21)
Status	Under restoration
Navigation Authority	Neath Canal Navigation Co, Port Tennant Navigation Co

Neath and Tennant Canal

legend Glynneath Basin 19 Maesmarchog Lock 18 Lamb and Flag Lock 17 Pentremalwed Lock 16 Cae-dan-y-cwmwl Lock 15 Granary Lock Road built over canal bed 14 Ysgwrfa Lock 13 Maesgwyn Lock 12 Ynys-yr-Allor Lock 11 Aberclwyd Lock Rheola aqueduct 10 Rheola Lock 9 Crugiau Lock 8 Resolven Uchaf Lock Limit of navigation Commercial Road culvert 7 Resolven Lock 6 Ynysarwed Uchaf Lock 5 Ynysarwed Isaf Lock A465(T) road Ynysbwllog aqueduct 4 Clun Uchaf Lock 3 Clun Isaf Lock 2 Lock Machin Aberdulais basin Aberdulais aqueduct Aberdulais Lock Tennant / R Neath / Neath 1 Tyn-yr-Heol Lock A465(T) road Neath Haverfordwest - London Rly A474 A465(T) M4 Giants Grave A48 Briton Ferry Dock Red Jacket Pill (site of lock) Rhondda & Swansea Bay Rly River Neath Crymlyn Junction Glan-y-wern canal Tir Isaf Colliery Branch Port Tennant King's Dock Swansea Docks Prince of Wales Dock and Sea lock Afon Tawe

The chamber of the newly restored Clun Isaf lock

Construction of the west pier to support the new Ynysbwllog aqueduct

The Neath and Tennant Canals were two independent but linked canals in South Wales that are usually regarded as a single canal. They are the subject of considerable restoration work and meet at Aberdulais basin.

Construction

The Neath Canal was authorised by an Act of Parliament passed on 6 June 1791, which created The Company and Proprietors of the Neath Canal Navigation, who had powers to raise £25,000 by the issuing of shares, and an additional £10,000 if required. As well as building the canal, the Canal Company could build inclined planes, railways or rollers if required, and could optionally use the bed of the River Neath. The canal was to run from Abernant to Neath.^[1] Thomas Dadford was employed as Engineer,^[2] and construction started from Neath, northwards towards Abernant (Glynneath). The canal had reached the River Neath at Ynysbwllog by 1792, when Dadford resigned to take up work on the Monmouthshire Canal. He was replaced by Thomas Sheasby^[2], who failed to complete the canal by the November 1793 deadline given to him, and was arrested in 1794 for irregularities in the accounts of the Glamorganshire Canal. The canal company completed the building work by 1795, using direct labour.

A second Neath Canal Act was passed on 26 May 1798, to authorise an extension of about 1 mile to Giants Grave,^[1] where facilities for transferring goods to sea-going vessels were available. This extension was completed by 1799.^[2] Between 1815 and 1842, additional docks and wharfs were build at Giants Grave, extending the length slightly, and the canal was eventually extended to Briton Ferry by the construction of the Jersey Canal in 1842, which was about 0.6 miles (1 km) long, and was built without an Act of Parliament. The final length of the canal was 13.5 miles, with 19 locks.

From the northern terminus, a tramway connected the canal to iron works at Aberdare and Hirwaun. This was built in 1803, and included an incline just north of Glynneath, which was powered by a high-pressure Trevithick steam engine.^[2] The Tappenden brothers had bought into the iron industry in 1802, and built the tramway because of high tolls on the Glamorganshire Canal^[3], but by 1814 they were bankrupt, and had no further connections with the canal.^[2] Huw Pudner and Bob Thomas have written a folk ballad called The Lockkeepers Daughter about the Neath canal.

The Tennant Canal

The Tennant Canal was built by George Tennant, initially as an extension of the Glan-y-Wern Canal, with the intention of linking the Tawe and Neath rivers. Work started in 1817, under the direction of the engineer William Kirkhouse, and the canal was complete from near the east pier on the River Tawe at Swansea to the River Neath at Red Jacket by 1818.^[4] However, barges from the Neath Canal could not cross the river, and so a further extension was started in 1820, to link with the Neath Canal basin at Aberdulais. The extension crosses the river on a 10-arched aqueduct, and the only lock on this section was situated at the south end of the aqueduct. The length of the canal, completed in 1824, was 8 miles, and it was built without an act of Parliament. It is still owned by the Coombe-Tennant family.^[2]

At the Swansea end, Tennant built a sea-lock, so that boats could enter Fabian Bay, and named the area Port Tennant. His terminus was destroyed when the Prince of Wales Dock was constructed by the Swansea Harbour Trust in 1881. It occupied all of the area which had been Fabian Bay, and so a lock was constructed so that boats could still reach tidal water by passing through the dock, and a wharf for the canal was constructed at the eastern end of the dock. Tennants wharf was again destroyed in 1898, when the dock was extended. Wharfage was provided for the canal along the entire southern side of the extension, but no lock was built to allow canal boats to enter the dock, even though the act of parliament made provision for one. A new branch of the canal was built in 1909, which included a lock into the newly constructed Kings Dock, where a lay-by berth was provided on its north side.^[5]Huw Pudner and Chris Hastings have written a folk ballad called the Red Jacket Stream about this canal.

Demise

The canals faced competition from the Vale of Neath Railway after 1851, but remained profitable until the early 1880s. Navigation on the Neath Canal came to an end in 1934, and on the Tennant canal soon afterwards. However, most of the infrastructure was maintained by the Neath Canal Company as the canals supplied water to local industries. Much of the final section from Ysgwrfa lock to Glyn Neath, including 5 locks, was lost when the Glynneath bypass was built. This road has since been superseded by the A465(T) dual carriageway.

At Port Tennant, the course of the canal has been covered over by railways, roads and other facilities of the port, but still supplies water to the Prince of Wales dock through a large culvert, which helps to maintain water levels in the docks.^[5]

Restoration

The canals are the subject of active restoration projects. The upper section from Resolven to Ysgwrfa was completed in 1990,.^[6] and received a Europa Nostra award in 1988 for the quality of the work, and a Civic Trust Award in 1992. The 4 million GBP project was jointly funded by the Welsh Office and the Prince of Wales Trust.^[6]

In 1993, the section from Ynysarwed to Tyn-yr-Heol lock at Tonna was polluted by iron-bearing water discharging from a mine adit. A treatment plant and wetlands were installed to clean the water, and this 1.6 million GBP project was commissioned in 1999.^[6]

The next restoration project involved the section from Neath town centre to Abergarwed, near the Ynysarwed locks. An initial 2.7 million GBP project enabled all of the polluted section to be cleaned, and much of the infrastructure to be restored. Nearly 65,000 tonnes of polluted material were dredged from the canal and removed.^[6] An additional 1.6 million GBP project was funded by the European Union Objective 1 project, the Welsh Assembly and Neath Port Talbot Council. This included complete replacement of the Ynysbwllog aqueduct,^[6] part of which was washed away in a flood in 1979. The water flow was maintained by replacing the missing arch with pipes, but the towpath was not re-instated until over 20 years later, when a steel footbridge was built. Completed in March 2008, the new 34m aqueduct is believed to be the longest single span aqueduct in the UK.^[6]

Glan-y-wern Canal

The Glan-y-wern Canal is a branch of the Tennant Canal which branches northwards in Crymlyn Burrows. It terminates at the Crymlyn Bog nature reserve, now a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI).

The canal was built to connect Richard Jenkins' colliery at Glan-y-wern with the River Neath at Trowman's Hole (or Red Jacket Pill), an inlet across the mud flats from the main channel of the river. Jenkins obtained a lease to build it from Lord Vernon on 14 August 1788, but died on the same day. Edward Elton took over management of the colliery, and the canal was constructed by 1790, although there was no actual connection to the river. It remained in use for about 20 years.^[7] Tennant incorporated the southern section into his Tennant Canal. The northern branch over the Crymlyn Bog was derelict by 1918.

See also

UK Waterways portal

• Canals of the United Kingdom
• History of the British canal system

References

External links

• Article about the canals with photographs
• Restoration details

Coordinates: 51°39′59″N 3°48′20″W / 51.66646°N 3.80569°W / 51.66646; -3.80569