| St Pancras Lock No. 4 | |
|---|---|
 St Pancras Lock, 2013 | |
 | |
| 51°32′10″N0°07′40″W / 51.536186°N 0.127877°W | |
| Waterway | Regent's Canal |
| County | Camden Greater London |
| Maintained by | Canal & River Trust |
| First built | 1819 |
| Fall | 8 feet (2.4 m) |
| Distance to Limehouse Basin | 4.4 miles (7.1 km) |
| Distance to Paddington Basin | 3.5 miles (5.6 km) |
St Pancras Lock is a lock on the Regent's Canal, in the London Borough of Camden, England. The St Pancras Basin is nearby.
Regent's Canal was authorised by an Act of Parliament obtained on 13 July 1812, for a canal from Paddington to Limehouse. [1] The directors had decided that all locks would be paired when they first met, but were then sidetracked by proposals to use hydro-pneumatic boat lifts. [2] Operation of a trial lift built at Camden Town was problematic, and after a suggestion by Earl Stanhope in 1815 that they revert to single locks, the proprietors decided to follow their original decision, and so a pair of locks was built at St Pancras, and at the eleven other locations where locks were needed. [3] After some delay caused by financial difficulties, building of the canal resumed in December 1817, and it was officially opened on 1 August 1820. [4] St Pancras lock was built towards the end of the project, being completed in 1819. [5] The use of paired locks was partly to save water, as water could be transferred between the locks, rather than all of it being discharged into the lower pound when a lock was emptied. This made operation of the locks more complex, and so they were permanently manned during the heyday of the canal, with lock-keepers working a shift system to provide 24-hour cover. As the use of the canal declined, in part due to railway competition, manning levels were reduced, and padlocks were used to prevent operation of the locks at the weekends. Following the end of commercial traffic and the growth of leisure boating, the locks reverted to operation by boat crews, and in order to prevent flooding caused by incorrect operation of the paddles, in the 1980s the gates were removed from the northernmost lock, and a weir and spillway were constructed at the lower end. [6]
Below the lock, the canal turns through a right-angled bend and is carried over the railway lines into Kings Cross station by an iron aqueduct. In 1939, stop locks were installed at both ends of the aqueduct, to limit damage to the railway in the event of damage to the structure by bombing. [7]
The canal at this point travels in a north-west to south-east direction, with the level dropping through the locks. To reach the lock, the canal passes under the railway lines to St Pancras railway station, and just beyond the bridge is the entrance to St Pancras Basin, which lies to the west of the lock, and provides a convenient winding hole for boats. [8] By the south-west corner of the lock is a Grade II Listed single storey lock keeper's cottage, built in yellow bricks with a gabled slate roof. It was originally built as a pumping station, and was designed by Sir John Wolfe Barry in 1898, but became a residence for the lock keeper in 1926. [9] Bordering the south-western bank of the canal as it continues to the south-east is the Camley Street Natural Park, a 2.1-acre (0.83 ha) local nature reserve opened in 1985 on the site of a former coal drop for King's Cross station. [10] The towpath is on the north-eastern side of the canal, and forms part of section 3 of the Jubilee Greenway, a network of paths totalling 37 miles (60 km) which was completed in 2012 to link the venues of the 2012 Summer Olympics to parks, waterways and other attractions. [11]
The next lock upstream is Kentish Town Lock No. 3, 0.7 miles (1.1 km) to the west, and the next lock downstream is City Road Lock No. 5, 1.0 mile (1.6 km) to the east. [12] The nearest London Underground station is King's Cross St Pancras. There are also National Rail stations at King's Cross and St Pancras.
The Stratford-upon-Avon Canal is a canal in the south Midlands of England. The canal, which was built between 1793 and 1816, runs for 25.5 miles (41.0 km) in total, and consists of two sections. The dividing line is at Kingswood Junction, which gives access to the Grand Union Canal. Following acquisition by a railway company in 1856, it gradually declined, the southern section being un-navigable by 1945, and the northern section little better.
The Chester Canal was an English canal linking the south Cheshire town of Nantwich with the River Dee at Chester. It was intended to link Chester to Middlewich, with a branch to Nantwich, but the Trent and Mersey Canal were unco-operative about a junction at Middlewich, and so the route to Nantwich was opened in 1779. There were also difficulties negotiating with the River Dee Company, and with no possibility of through traffic, the canal was uneconomic. Part of it was closed in 1787, when Beeston staircase locks collapsed, and there was no money to fund repairs. When the Ellesmere Canal was proposed in 1790, the company saw it as a ray of hope, and somehow managed to keep the struggling canal open. The Ellesmere Canal provided a link to the River Mersey at Ellesmere Port from 1797, and the fortunes of the Chester Canal began to improve.
Regent's Canal is a canal across an area just north of central London, England. It provides a link from the Paddington Arm of the Grand Union Canal, 550 yards (500 m) north-west of Paddington Basin in the west, to the Limehouse Basin and the River Thames in east London. The canal is 8.6 miles (13.8 km) long.
The Huddersfield Broad Canal or Sir John Ramsden's Canal, is a wide-locked navigable canal in West Yorkshire in northern England. The waterway is 3.75 miles (6 km) long and has 9 wide locks. It follows the valley of the River Colne and connects the Calder and Hebble Navigation at Cooper Bridge junction with the Huddersfield Narrow Canal near Aspley Basin in Huddersfield.
Whilton Locks is the name of a flight of seven locks on the Grand Union Canal near Daventry, in the county of Northamptonshire, England. They are also referred to as Buckby Lock Flight.
The New Junction Canal is a canal in South Yorkshire, England. It is part of the Sheffield and South Yorkshire Navigation (S&SYN), although it was jointly funded by the Aire and Calder Navigation, and was opened in 1905. It links the River Don Navigation and the Stainforth and Keadby Canal with the Aire and Calder Navigation. It is completely straight, and was the last canal built in England for commercial purposes.
The Swansea Canal was a canal constructed by the Swansea Canal Navigation Company between 1794 and 1798, running for 16.5 miles (26.6 km) from Swansea to Hen Neuadd, Abercraf in South Wales. It was steeply graded, and 36 locks were needed to enable it to rise 373 feet (114 m) over its length. The main cargos were coal, iron and steel, and the enterprise was profitable.
Camden Lock is a small part of Camden Town, London Borough of Camden, England, which was formerly a wharf with stables on the Regent's Canal. It is immediately to the north of Hampstead Road Locks, a twin manually operated lock. The twin locks together are "Hampstead Road Lock 1"; each bears a sign so marked. Hawley Lock and Kentish Town Lock are a short distance away to the east; to the west is a long level pound — it is 27 miles (43 km) to the next lock.
The Stainforth and Keadby Canal is a navigable canal in South Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, England. It connects the River Don Navigation at Bramwith to the River Trent at Keadby, by way of Stainforth, Thorne and Ealand, near Crowle. It opened in 1802, passed into the control of the River Don Navigation in 1849, and within a year was controlled by the first of several railway companies. It became part of the Sheffield and South Yorkshire Navigation, an attempt to remove several canals from railway control, in 1895. There were plans to upgrade it to take larger barges and to improve the port facilities at Keadby, but the completion of the New Junction Canal in 1905 made this unnecessary, as Goole could easily be reached and was already a thriving port.
The Selby Canal is a 6-mile (9.7 km) canal with 2 locks which bypasses the lower reaches of the River Aire in Yorkshire, England, from the village of West Haddlesey to the town of Selby where it joins the River Ouse. It opened in 1778, and provided the main outlet for the Aire and Calder Navigation until 1826, when it was bypassed by a new cut from Ferrybridge to Goole. Selby steadily declined after that, although traffic to York still used the canal.
The Four Counties Ring is a canal ring which links the four English counties of Cheshire, Staffordshire, Shropshire and West Midlands.
The North Pennine Ring is a canal ring which crosses the Pennines between Manchester, Leeds and Castleford. It follows parts of five canals, and shares much of its route with the Outer Pennine Ring, which uses a different route for the southern crossing of the Pennines.
Bosley Lock Flight is a flight of twelve canal locks, situated on the Macclesfield Canal at Bosley, near Macclesfield, Cheshire, England. The locks are substantially built with stone blocks, and unusually for narrow locks have mitre gates at both ends. They were each built with a side pond, which enabled some of the water to be re-used during a filling and emptying cycle. The side ponds have been disused for many years, but there are plans to reinstate one of them for demonstration purposes.
Dukinfield Junction is the name of the canal junction where the Peak Forest Canal, the Ashton Canal and the Huddersfield Narrow Canal meet near Ashton-under-Lyne, Greater Manchester, England. The area has been designated by Tameside Metropolitan Borough Council as a conservation area.
Rushall Junction is the southern limit of the Rushall Canal where it meets the Tame Valley Canal in the West Midlands, England. It opened in 1847, when the Rushall Canal was built to create connections between the Birmingham Canal Navigations system and the Wyrley and Essington Canal, following the amalgamation of the two companies in 1840.
Tuel Lane Lock is a canal lock, situated on the Rochdale Canal in Sowerby Bridge, England. It was built in 1996 as part of the canal's restoration, and replaces two previous locks, locks 3 and 4, from the original canal system. With a fall of 19 feet 8.5 inches (6 m), it is the deepest lock in the United Kingdom.
City Road Lock is a lock on the Regent's Canal, in the London Borough of Islington, England. It is located a short distance to the east of Islington Tunnel, and immediately to the west of City Road Basin.
The Newport Pagnell Canal was a 1.25 mile canal in Buckinghamshire that ran from the Grand Junction Canal at Great Linford to Newport Pagnell through seven locks. Construction was authorised by an Act of Parliament in June 1814 and it probably opened in 1817. It closed in 1864, with part of the route used for the line of a railway.
Bascote locks form a flight of four locks on the Grand Union Canal, which is part of the British canal system and connects London and Birmingham. The lock flight has a staircase, and at the highest lock the remains of older narrow locks can be seen.
Camley Street is a street in the London Borough of Camden in London, England. It lies in St Pancras and King's Cross: stretching over a kilometre from St Pancras railway station in the south, over the Regent's Canal, and to Agar Grove in the north.
