Basin and lock-keepers' house, view from west

Description Basin and lock-keepers' house, view from west

Date 18/9/2001

Collection Records of the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland (RCAHMS), Edinbu

Catalogue Number E 6453 CN

Category Photographs and Off-line Digital Images

Copies SC 681708

Scope and Content Upper Basin, Bowling Basin, Forth & Clyde Canal, West Dunbartonshire, from west This shows the irregular pentagon-shaped upper basin which was built around 1896 for the Caledonian Railway's Canal Department. The walls of the basin are of mass concrete, grooved to resemble stonework, and the copes are ridged. The canal keepers' cottages, also built around 1896, are located beside a lock in the background. This canal basin is where boats that were used on the canal would have docked between journeys. The main purpose of the canal was to provide a safe route for ships travelling from the west and east coasts. It also improved trade as imported and locally produced goods could be transported to towns near the canal. Passenger transportation was also an important use as there were many villages and towns along the canal. The Forth & Clyde Canal was built between 1768 and 1790. It could have been completed sooner but funds ran out in 1777 and more money was not found by the government until 1784. John Smeaton (1724-92) was the designer and first chief engineer for the project. He was replaced in 1777 by Robert Mackell (d.1779), and in 1785 Robert Whitworth (1734-99) took over the building of the final section of the canal from Glasgow. When the canal was completed in 1790 it ran from the River Forth at Grangemouth, in the east, to Bowling on the River Clyde in the west of Scotland. The canal was linked to Edinburgh when the Union Canal was opened in 1822. The Forth & Clyde Canal was closed in 1963 and the Union Canal in 1965 and the construction of new roads meant that it was impossible for boats to travel along the full length of these watercourses. However, the £84.5m Millennium Link project enabled the canals to reopen in 2002. Source: RCAHMS contribution to SCRAN.

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