Archaeology Notes

Event ID 846777

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Archaeology Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/846777

NS67SE 67 65740 73935

See also NS67SE 4 and LIN 17.

(Location cited as NS 657 739). 'There is a fine aqueduct over the Luggie at Kirkintilloch'.

J R Hume 1976.

This is an imposing structure comprising a single arch, parapets at the offside and cast iron railings at the towpath. The arch was utilised formerly by the Campsie Branch railway as a convenient location to cross the canal. The water was culverted beneath its tracks.

The Forth and Clyde Canal Guidebook 1991.

The canal crossed over the Luggie Water on a sturdy single arch, an aqueduct which became known as 'The Unique Bridge,' as the Campsie Branch Railway utilised this route to pass under the canal. There were two smaller arches to the front of the aqueduct, on which the railway passed over the culverted Luggie Water.

G Hutton 1993.

This fine structure carries the canal over the Luggie Water. In the past it took the canal over a railway line as well.

H Brown 1997.

This aqueduct, with both railway and Luggie Water passing beneath, is clearly marked on the 1st edition of the OS 6-inch map (Dunbartonshire 1864-5, sheet xxiv) and also the OS 1:2500 map (1968). The aqueduct over the Luggie Water is still visible on the current edition of the OS 1:10000 map (1991), but the railway has disappeared.

Information from RCAHMS (MD) 26 September 2000.

Built 1768-75 by John Smeaton (engineer), a single segmental-arch grey ashlar aqueduct carrying the eastern section of the Forth & Clyde Canal over the Luggie Water. A low two-arched bridge beneath the aqueduct was subsequently added to carry a railway over the Luggie Water, and at the time of survey in 2001, had been converted to a footpath.

(2001 photographic survey material is stored under 'Forth and Clyde Canal' in the NMRS).

Information from RCAHMS (MKO) 2001.

When built, this aqueduct to the W of Hillhead was the crowning glory of the canal so far, nothing like it having been built in Scotland before. It comprises a single impressive arch, of 50ft [15.2m] span and 90ft [27.4m] deep. As if to add to its uniqueness, the contractors (Gibb and Moir, from Falkirk) made the arch in three sections, moving the wooden centring between successive stages. The resulting joints are hard to detect.

G Hutton 2002.

This short aqueduct carries the Forth and Clyde Canal (NS67SE 4/LIN 17) over the Lugar Water a short distance E of the centre of Kirkintilloch. It is depicted, but not noted, on the 1971 edition of the OS 1:1250 map and the 1991 edition of the OS 1:10,000 map.

The location assigned to this record defines the centre of the span.

Information from RCAHMS (RJCM), 6 January 2006.