Fernilee Reservoir is a drinking-water reservoir fed by the

River Goyt The River Goyt is a tributary of the River Mersey in North West England. Etymology The name ''Goyt'' may be derived from the Middle English ''gote'', meaning "a watercourse, a stream". Derivation from the Welsh ''gwyth'' meaning "vein" has be ...

in the

Peak District National Park Peak or The Peak may refer to: Basic meanings Geology * Mountain peak ** Pyramidal peak, a mountaintop that has been sculpted by erosion to form a point Mathematics * Peak hour or rush hour, in traffic congestion * Peak (geometry), an (''n''-3)-d ...

, within the county of

Derbyshire Derbyshire ( ) is a ceremonial county in the East Midlands of England. It borders Greater Manchester, West Yorkshire, and South Yorkshire to the north, Nottinghamshire to the east, Leicestershire to the south-east, Staffordshire to the south a ...

and very close to the boundary with

Cheshire Cheshire ( ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in North West England. It is bordered by Merseyside to the north-west, Greater Manchester to the north-east, Derbyshire to the east, Staffordshire to the south-east, and Shrop ...

. The village of Fernliee sits at the north end of the reservoir, with Goyt's Moss to the south and between Hoo Moor to the west and

Combs Moss Combs Moss is a plateau-topped hill between Chapel-en-le-Frith and Buxton in Derbyshire, in the Peak District. The summit, Combs Head, is above sea level. At its northern tip is a prehistoric promontory fort called Castle Naze. The moorland pl ...

to the east. The sluice tower at Fernilee - geograph

It was inaugurated in 1932 (following an Act of Parliament in 1825) and construction was completed in 1938, costing £480,000. Its capacity is about 5 billion litres and is 38m deep. Local farming families were forced to leave their ancestral land. A 'Tin Town'

corrugated iron Corrugated galvanised iron (CGI) or steel, colloquially corrugated iron (near universal), wriggly tin (taken from UK military slang), pailing (in Caribbean English), corrugated sheet metal (in North America), zinc (in Cyprus and Nigeria) or ...

temporary village was built near Fernilee for the

navvy Navvy, a Clipping (morphology), clipping of navigator (United Kingdom, UK) or navigational engineer (United States, US), is particularly applied to describe the manual Laborer, labourers working on major civil engineering projects and occasional ...

workers. The hamlet of Goyt's Bridge and Errwood Hall (the Grimshawe family mansion) were destroyed in the 1930s to prevent any pollution of the water running into Fernilee Reservoir. The

reservoir A reservoir (; ) is an enlarged lake behind a dam, usually built to water storage, store fresh water, often doubling for hydroelectric power generation. Reservoirs are created by controlling a watercourse that drains an existing body of wa ...

was the first and lower of two reservoirs built by the Stockport Corporation Waterworks (after they acquired the Grimshawe estate) in the

Goyt Valley The River Goyt is a tributary of the River Mersey in North West England. Etymology The name ''Goyt'' may be derived from the Middle English ''gote'', meaning "a watercourse, a stream". Derivation from the Welsh ''gwyth'' meaning "vein" has be ...

, the other one being

Errwood Reservoir Errwood Reservoir is a drinking-water reservoir in the Peak District National Park, within the county of Derbyshire and very close to the boundary with Cheshire. The reservoir was the second of two reservoirs built in the Goyt Valley, the oth ...

. The Street

Roman road Roman roads ( ; singular: ; meaning "Roman way") were physical infrastructure vital to the maintenance and development of the Roman state, built from about 300 BC through the expansion and consolidation of the Roman Republic and the Roman Em ...

runs alongside Errwood Reservoir and to the west of Fernilee Reservoir. Both reservoirs were built by Lehane, Mackenzie and Shand. The reservoir provides drinking water for

Stockport Stockport is a town in Greater Manchester, England, south-east of Manchester, south-west of Ashton-under-Lyne and north of Macclesfield. The River Goyt, Rivers Goyt and River Tame, Greater Manchester, Tame merge to create the River Mersey he ...

town and the surrounding area. It is currently owned and operated by

United Utilities United Utilities Group plc (UU) is the United Kingdom's largest listed water company. It was founded in 1995 as a result of the merger of North West Water and NORWEB. The group manages the regulated water and waste water network in North West En ...

. The lower

Toddbrook Reservoir Toddbrook Reservoir, a feeder for the Peak Forest Canal, opened in 1838. It is above the town of Whaley Bridge in the High Peak, Derbyshire, High Peak area of Derbyshire, England. The reservoir is a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) pro ...

Whaley Bridge Whaley Bridge () is a town and civil parishes in England, civil parish in the High Peak Borough Council, High Peak district of Derbyshire, England. It is situated on the River Goyt, south-east of Manchester, north of Buxton, north-east of Mac ...

drains into the River Goyt but is fed from the Todd Brook stream. The disused

Cromford and High Peak Railway The Cromford and High Peak Railway (C&HPR) was a Standard-gauge railway, standard-gauge line between the Cromford Canal wharf at High Peak Junction and the Peak Forest Canal at Whaley Bridge. The railway, which was completed in 1831, was built t ...

line (which connected the High Peak canal at

with the River Derwent in

Cromford Cromford () is a village and civil parish in Derbyshire, England, in the valley of the River Derwent between Wirksworth and Matlock. It is north of Derby, south of Matlock and south of Matlock Bath. Cromford is first mentioned in the 11t ...

) runs along the east side of the reservoir. This stretch of the railway line was closed in 1896. The creation of the reservoir submerged the Chilworth Gunpowder Mill. It manufactured chemical explosives from the 16th century until

World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

. The

Peak District Boundary Walk The Peak District Boundary Walk is a circular walking trail, starting and finishing at Buxton and broadly following the boundary of the Peak District, Britain's first national park. The route was developed by the Friends of the Peak District (a ...

crosses the Errwood Dam at the head of Fernilee Reservoir and then tracks along the west side of the reservoir.

References

{{authority control Reservoirs of the Peak District Reservoirs in Derbyshire Peak District