The Regeneration of Ashby Canal, with members of The Ashby Canal Association
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The audio clips were recorded by Dave Kitto in July 2005. To listen to them you will need Windows Media Player 9 or 10, or similar software such as Winamp or Real Player. Audio clips are accompanied by the  icon
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The Ashby de la Zouch Canal opened in 1804, ironically it never reached the North West Leicestershire town but it did meet the needs of local industry in accessing new markets for coal and limestone, which were produced along its way as it meandered north from Marston Junction. Marston was an important connection to the rest of the country’s canal network, which eased the distribution of goods to all points of the compass. Like many canals it eventually lost business to the burgeoning railway network which could offer faster and often cheaper transportation and commercial use eventually ended in 1966. In the same year the Ashby Canal Association was founded, motivated by local protest to the canal closure, to protect and promote the canal and to actively support its fascinating regeneration.
A feasibility study commissioned by Leicestershire County Council in the 1990s found no insurmountable obstacles to restoration of the canal. Initially restoration was thought to be to Moira only, but the advent of The National Forest, its visitor centre, and the regeneration of The Moira Furnace Museum, the latter both adjacent to the canal, inspired the move to restore the whole canal to its original terminus.
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Restored Moira Furnace and Ashby Canal. Images by Di Kitto
 Brian Waring talks about Moira Furnace & Ashby Canal...
Moira Furnace was built in 1804 and is one of the best preserved blast furnaces in Europe. The 1851 census records more than 60 people living at the furnace itself. The Ashby Canal took iron products away from the furnace.
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The projects have been so successful that a section of the canal around the Moira Furnace has been reopened and has fast become a popular attraction. Now in 2005 funding has been acquired to re open a further 8 mile section of the abandoned canal north of Snarestone.
In October 2005 LANDshapes joined members of The Ashby Canal Association and Measham Community Office, to hear about the fascinating journey so far and the vision of the future of the Ashby Canal.
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The Regeneration of Ashby Canal with: |
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The Ashby Canal (or the Burton on Trent from the Coventry Canal) was known to working boat people as the ‘Moira Cut’ as it finished at Moira, and never actually went to Ashby de la Zouch. Its purpose was to serve the coal mines of the Ashby Woulds, west of the market town of Ashby de la Zouch.
Plans for the Ashby Canal were mooted as early as the 1770s and but it wasn’t until the 1790s, when markets for coal were flourishing, that a bill was presented to parliament for a broad canal from Marston to the Ashby Woulds.
In 1794 the Act was passed and construction started on 2nd October. A troubled period of adjustments to plans and cost increases ensued until the canal was finally completed and opened in 1804 at a cost of £184,000. Notable engineers involved at differing stages were Robert Whitworth Snr and Jnr, Jessop, Outram and Thomas Newbold. By 1804 a new deep mine at Moira was producing high quality coal and the need for transportation was great. Colliery companies benefited by avoiding slow, ill-equipped toll roads and commercial transportation by the Ashby Canal Company flourished.
The Ashby Canal is a wide (14ft) canal and it joins the canal network through the Coventry Canal. The Coventry is a narrow canal, which was intended to be, but never actually was, widened.
At one time there were 28 pits adjacent to the canal. Ironically the very industry, coal, which led to the canal’s initial prosperity, later became its downfall. In1846 the Midland Railway Company purchased the Ashby Canal and associated tramways serving the coalfields, for £110,000. The company immediately applied for an Act of Parliament for a railway from Nuneaton to Burton on Trent although railway competition did not emerge until 1873, taking an almost parallel route to the canal as the ‘Ashby to Nuneaton Joint Railway’.
In 1944 the new owners, the London, Midland and Scottish Railway, closed 2 ½ miles of the canal north of Donisthorpe, having been unsuccessful in their attempts to pass this section of the canal, troubled by subsidence, free of charge to the Coventry Canal Company. In later years the abandoned section just north of Snarestone was an ideal place for nearby collieries to off load waste and spoil.
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Gerald Box, Local Historian
and Association member Diane Everett
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Although the Ashby Canal had continued to be profitable by the mid 1960s the canal’s commercial use was effectively at an end. During the mid 1990s practically all the mines had either closed through exhaustion of stocks or as the result of then government’s policy of winding down the coal industry. The 1968 Transport Act designated 22 miles of the Ashby Canal as a cruise way, administered by British Waterways, and not long after the last commercial narrow boat load of 45 ½ tons of coal from Donisthorpe pit was carried from Gopsall Wharf. |
Originally the canal was to have branches to lime works at Ticknall and Cloud Hill near Breedon, but mounting expense caused these to be substituted by horse-drawn tramways, on a 12 mile network. From Willesley Basin, about 2 miles away from the town, trams arrived in Ashby at Wharf Yard, near Canal Cottages, behind the church on Bath Street.
In 2006 the tramway can still be identified in the landscape around these areas, notably from embankments near Willesley Road, on your left travelling from Ashby towards Donisthorpe, and in Ticknall by the tramway bridge over the main road through the village.
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In 1850 the tramway from Willesley to Ashby was closed and the rails removed. The northern section continued with coal and limestone being trans-shipped to a main railway line (Midland Leicester to Burton blt.1849) in Ashby. In 1865 the Ashby to Cloud Hill track was changed to a standard gauge and continued to Derby. The Ticknall to Old Parks section remained in use until early in the 20th century.
Measham Community Office became involved in the regeneration of Ashby Canal in 1992 as part of their work to support the rejuvenation of the village. The office was designed to bring new industry and employment to the area, after the pit closures. They welcome the potential social, economic and cultural benefits that the canal can bring to Measham and the surrounding area. They also support tourism, and the restoration of traditional rural crafts.
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