CANALS

In 1793 the Birmingham & Warwick Canal was begun from a junction stoplock on the Digbeth Branch east of the basin. Crossing the Rea on an aqueduct of two arches it climbs up the valley of Bordesley Brook (whose water it used to tap at Glover Street) by way of six narrow locks, Camp Hill 52-57, to a summit level at 380 feet off Sampson Road North, where there are two short loading arms. Therefrom it is lock-free for ten miles to Knowle, going south-east through Bordesley (originally having a small reservoir at the site of Small Heath Bridge), curving along the side of Spark Brook valley, crossing the Cole on an earthen bank and brick aqueduct.

A feeder from the Spark was led under Stratford Road to enter the canal at what became Anderton Road Public Works wharf. Four humped bridges took rights of way over the summit level in Bordesley By 1796 water supply was already a problem: a pumping station was built at Bowyer Street to return water to the summit, and Olton Reservoir was built by French prisoners to be the chief source of supply. Three years later the canal was joined to the Oxford Canal at Napton and thereby to the Thames. As the waterway that linked the Black Country and Birmingham to London, the Warwick Canal was well-used and prosperous for several decades.

Congestion through Birmingham led to the construction, jointly with Birmingham Canal Navigation, of the Birmingham & Warwick Junction Canal, three miles long, which with the new Tame Valley Canal provided a bypass for the town cuts from 1844. The Junction Canal leaves the Warwick north of Adderley Street and goes north-east under five Bordesley streets. There are seven locks down to Salford.

The site for the Birmingham Small Arms Works on Golden Hillock was chosen because it lay between the Warwick Canal and the Oxford (Great Western Railway) Railway line. A short branch was made to the original factory at the east end of Armoury Road. During World War One a basin with wharfage for four narrow boats was cut east of the Oxford line embankment. This is long since drained and blocked, as is the Works branch. In the 1890s Public Works depots were built on the City canals in several districts: there were two in Bordesley, at Anderton Road and Sandy Lane, and in 1898 a refuse destructor was built off Montagu Street.

In 1929 the Warwick Canal joined with the Grand Junction Canal (which since 1805 had given it a more direct access to London) to form the Grand Union: during the next decade dredging and the piling of banks improved the waterway. Outside Birmingham wide locks were built to take motor boats and tows together, but no attempt was made to replace Camp Hill locks which were hemmed in by buildings and bridged four times. Sampson Road wharves became a major transhipment centre, and the G.U. was well-used during the last war.