Bridge 83
This is the 83rd bridge from the start of the canal at Huddersfield and known as
Royal George Bridge.
The road crosses the canal close to lock 23W. The canal is always at its narrowest at locks and its not unusual for bridges to be built next to them beacuse the narrowness at that point makes the bridge cheaper and easier to build.
Although canals often appear to be full of still water, it does actually have a flow and locks always have an overflow channel to allow excess water to bypass the lock. When a bridge is built near to a bridge the it usually also crosses the over flow channel. In this case there is a gap between the lock and the bridge and the overflow channel has a a small outlet next to the arch of the bridge.
It is a Heritage England Grade II Listed building
link with the following text "The Royal George Canal Bridge. Canal bridge. 1798 with later widening, associated with the Huddersfield Narrow Canal. Possibly by Benjamin Outram, Engineer. Millstone Grit with cast iron reinforcement, and cast iron lamp standard. One side is faced in rough ashlar, with heavy voussoirs. The other is constructed from large blocks of stone, resting on a cast iron girder in an unusual manner (compare Division Bridge nearby). The bridge spans both canal and tow-path. A subsidiary arch beneath the iron girder provides an outlet for a stream. HISTORY: this section of the Huddersfield Narrow Canal was built in 1796-97; this bridge was constructed to serve Gibb Mill, a fulling mill dating from the mid-1780s. The bridge was probably widened in the mid-1830s, when the cast iron girders, of interest in their own right, were inserted; the lamp may date from this time also, which saw the construction of the Royal George Mills.".
The Huddersfield Narrow Canal
This canal is one of three that crosses the Pennine Hills and built to provide transport between Huddersfield in Yorkshire and Ashton-Under-Lyne in Lancashire.
As the name suggest it is a narrow canal that although was cheaper to build had less carrying capacity compared to the other two broad canals.
Work started on it in 1794 and partly due to the need to construct the longest canal tunnel in the United Kingdom it was completed 17 years later in 1811.
The canal is only 20 miles long and due to the nature of the terrain has 74 locks even though the summit tunnel reduced the required number of locks. The canal climbs 436 feet from Huddersfield and descends 334 feet to Ashton-Under-Lyne.
In theory having a summit tunnel to reduce the number of locks means that the journey times should be relatively short. However the tunnel does not have a tow path and when it was first opened it was necessary to lead the horses over the moor to the other end of the tunnel. Meanwhile it was necessary to leg the boat through the tunnel. This involved specialist workers who lay on their backs and used their legs with their feet against the tunnel wall to leg the boat through.
Competition from the railways led to the closure of the canal in 1944.
During the 1970s leisure boating in the U.K. had become popular and there were various campaigns to re-open canals that had lain derelict for a number of years.
Work on restoring this canal started in 1981 and the whole canal was finally reopened by 2001. These days the canal is only open to leisure boaters and with the re-opening of other connecting canals it is possible to travel far and wide.
However boats are restricted to maximum width of 6 feet 10 inches and a draught of 3 feet 3 inches which does restrict some boats that are used on the broad canals.