The Canal History
The Rochdale Canal was completed in 1804 and is one of three canals that cross the Pennine hills. This is the only one that doesn’t use tunnels. In addition it was a broad canal with bridges and locks that allowed boats of 14 feet width to pass through.
The one downside of not using tunnels is that it originally had 92 locks. These days two of them have been combined into one deep lock.
Competition from railways and roads subsequently led to a decline in goods being carried and by 1937 the only section left in operation was at the Manchester end of the canal.
In 1965 there was talk of abandoning the canal but by this time leisure boating had become very popular in the UK and there was a campaign to keep it open. Work was started and the canal slowly re-opened in a number of different stages. The whole length finally reopened in September 2007.
All the locks on the canal have a standard length of 72 feet (22 metres).
Details of this lock
This lock is known as Lob Mill Lock, and there is a stone arch bridge that is wide enough to take road traffic very close to the lock.
A lock always forms the narrowest part of the canal and so building the bridge where the canal is still narrow makes it smaller and cheaper to build.
At the other end of the lock is a small footbridge to give access to both sides of the lock for operating the gates.
On many locks there are warning signs about making sure the boat does not get caught on the cill.
It's not always obvious what this means, but basically the wooden lock gate does not go to the bottom of the lock but sits on a stone base. When the lock is full and a boat is going down, the cill is not visible. This means that when the water is released from the lock it is possible for the boat to get caught on the cill.
The lock was at its lowest water level when I took the pictures and the cill is clearly visible. When the cill is visible it's much easier to understand the hidden danger.
This lock was made a Grade II listed building by English Heritage in 1984 before the canal was restored,
reference number 1278642. The website states that the lock has brick retaining walls. English bond, with blue brick headers.
This is very unusual for the locks on this canal, the majority of them have large stone retaining walls.