Ashton Canal

Four outstanding Aqueducts

Store Street (or Shooters Brook) Aqueduct was built in Ancoats, Manchester, by Benjamin Outram in 1797, the year prior to his official appointment as the Consulting Engineer for the Ashton Canal Company. This single-arch structure is believed to be the first major skew aqueduct to be built in Britain, the skew angle being 45°. When constructed it carried the Ashton Canal over Shooters Brook but today this is culverted below Store Street.

The principles of construction of this type of aqueduct were not fully understood prior to this time and earlier aqueducts were built square to the crossing. The skew angle is defined as the inclination of the centre line of the aqueduct to the normal of the centre line of the river or road.

This aqueduct is Grade II* listed, List Entry No. 1270666.

Store Street Aqueduct, Ancoats, Manchester, c.2000.

Tame Aqueduct in Ashton-under-Lyne carries a short branch of the Ashton Canal across the river Tame into Dukinfield, where it makes a head-on junction with the Peak Forest Canal. The three arches of this squat structure are semi-elliptical in form, because of the limited headroom, and they rest on rectangular piers with rounded ends. Four pilasters, one above each pier and one on each abutment strengthen the side walls.

This aqueduct is Grade II listed, List Entry No. 1356423.

Tame Aqueduct, Ashton-under-Lyne, 4 Feb 2006.

View looking downstream.

Waterhouses Aqueduct is a single-arched structure on the Hollinwood Branch of the Ashton Canal. It is curved deeply inwards in plan, the walls are battered and there is a buttress on each abutment. The deep curvature of the walls form arches in plan and this enables it to resist both water pressure and earth pressure from the steep banks of the river Medlock.

This aqueduct is Grade II listed, List Entry No. 1356454.

Waterhouses Aqueduct, 11 Jun 1983.

View from the river Medlock, Daisy Nook, looking upstream.

Iron Aqueduct is a single-arched aqueduct at Daisy Nook on the Hollinwood Branch of the Ashton Canal. This aqueduct is curved inwards in plan and the walls are battered. The canal is carried across it in a cast-iron trough which can just be seen beneath the arch. The stone tablet in the parapet bears the date, '1859'.

Iron Aqueduct, Daisy Nook, Daisy Nook, Aug 1983.

This aqueduct carries the canal over Crime Ln.