Autherley Junction () is the name of the canal junction where the

Shropshire Union Canal The Shropshire Union Canal, sometimes nicknamed the "Shroppie", is a navigable canal in England. It is the modern name for a part of the Shropshire Union Railways and Canal Company network. In the leisure age, two of the branches of that netwo ...

terminates and meets the

Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal The Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal is a navigable narrow canal in Staffordshire and Worcestershire in the The Midlands, England, Midlands of England. It is long, linking the River Severn at Stourport in Worcestershire with the Trent a ...

near to Oxley, north

Wolverhampton Wolverhampton ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands (county), West Midlands of England. Located around 12 miles (20 km) north of Birmingham, it forms the northwestern part of the West Midlands conurbation, with the towns of ...

, West Midlands,

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

History

The Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal was opened in 1772. It provided a link between the

Trent and Mersey Canal The Trent and Mersey Canal is a canal in Derbyshire, Staffordshire and Cheshire in north-central England. It is a "narrow canal" for the vast majority of its length, but at the extremities to the east of Burton upon Trent and north of Middl ...

at Great Haywood Junction in the north and the

River Severn The River Severn (, ), at long, is the longest river in Great Britain. It is also the river with the most voluminous flow of water by far in all of England and Wales, with an average flow rate of at Apperley, Gloucestershire. It rises in t ...

at Stourport in the south. A significant trade soon developed between the Potteries and the south west. to the south of the junction site, the canal was joined by the

Birmingham Canal Navigations Birmingham Canal Navigations (BCN) is a network of canals connecting Birmingham, Wolverhampton, and the eastern part of the Black Country. The BCN is connected to the rest of the English canal system at several junctions. It was owned and opera ...

at Aldersley Junction, which provided a route for manufactured goods to pass northwards. In 1835, the Birmingham and Liverpool Junction Canal opened, connecting the Chester Canal at

Nantwich Nantwich ( ) is a market town and civil parish in the unitary authority of Cheshire East in Cheshire, England. It has among the highest concentrations of listed buildings in England, with notably good examples of Tudor and Georgian architecture ...

to the Staffordshire and Worcestershire at Autherley. It was one of the new generation of canals, which instead of following the contours, used cuttings and embankments to provide a more direct route, and had locks organised into flights where continuing on the level was not possible. Its effect on the Staffordshire and Worcestershire was immediate, with most of the traffic which had previously travelled northwards from Birmingham diverting onto the newer faster route. The Staffordshire and Worcestershire could now only charge tolls for the short distance between Aldersley and Autherley Junctions, instead of the whole to Great Haywood, and in order to minimise the loss of income, they raised the tolls for this section to absurd levels. In order to resolve the situation, the Birmingham and Liverpool Junction Canal worked with the Birmingham Canal company and proposed the Tettenhall and Autherley Canal and Aqueduct. This would have left the Birmingham Canal just above lock 19, crossed the Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal just below Aldersley Junction by an aqueduct made of iron, and then dropped down through three locks to join the canal above the stop lock. The plans were drawn up by Dugdale Houghton, a firm of surveyors from Birmingham, and a bill was presented to Parliament, but the canal was never constructed, as the Staffordshire and Worcestershire company reduced their tolls rather than lose them altogether. The Birmingham and Liverpool Junction Canal became part of the Shropshire Union Canal network in 1846.

Location

Autherley Junction is on the summit level of the Staffordshire and Worcestershire canal, and is around above sea level. It is also the highest point on the Shropshire Union Canal main line, which descends through 46 locks to

Ellesmere Port Ellesmere Port ( ) is a port town in the Cheshire West and Chester borough in Cheshire, England. Ellesmere Port is on the south-eastern edge of the Wirral Peninsula, north of Chester, on the bank of the Manchester Ship Canal. In the 2021 Unite ...

. A stop lock with a minimal drop of just a few inches was built by the Birmingham and Liverpool Junction Canal just before the junction, to ensure that they did not take large volumes of water from the Staffordshire and Worcestershire to supply their canal. It remains in use, although both canals are now managed by the

Canal & River Trust The Canal & River Trust (CRT), branded as in Wales, holds the guardianship of 2,000 miles of canals and rivers, together with reservoirs and a wide range of heritage buildings and structures, in England and Wales. Launched on 12 July 2012, the ...

and so theft of water is no longer an issue.

Bibliography

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History

Location

Bibliography

References

See also