Tracing the Aberdeenshire Canal - great website!

[jeffree]

I stumbled across this on a football forum believe it or not and found it very interesting. I know this isn't exactly sailing......but still relevant.

http://www.74simon.co.uk/aberdeenshirecanal/index.html

cracking read for those interested in this sort of thing.

[ash]

Yes, very interesting. Thanks for that.

One of the engineers on my college course in the 1970's did a study of scottish canals as his final year project. I wonder if he continued his interest?

Ash

[Telo]

Interesting. In the 60's, while at school, I did a bit of research into the canal that was planned from Eglinton Street in the Gorbals in Glasgow, to Ardrossan, on the Ayrshire coast. I can't remember now how much of it was completed, but in the 50s and 60s there was still plenty of physical evidence lying around. The Earl of Eglinton's original plan was to extend the Glasgow - Paisley - Johnstone canal through Beith, Kilwinning, Stevenston and Saltcoats to Ardrossan.

The origins of my interest in it are a bit odd. As kids we used to like a bit of adventure by playing in the railway marshalling yards that pre-existed the present day Shields Road railway depot in Glasgow. There used to be a large straggling wooden station at Shields Road, with lines running into both St Enoch's and Central Stations. West of the station, lines ran past the marshalling yards to Renfrewshire and Ayrshire.

Breaking into railway yards was of course illegal, but it was a great place for adventurous kids, and of course our parents had no idea that we were exploring such a dangerous place. Looking back, it was a criminally stupid thing to do, but kids being kids.... It all came out, and we stopped going in there, when one of the boys had the shock of discovering a man who'd hanged himself from the the luggage rack of one of the old corridor trains.

Anyway, nestling in the tangle of undergrowth, close by St Andrews Drive, were the fairly complete remains of an old wooden barge left high and dry after the the railways took over. The development of the railways and the dredging of the Clyde allowing ships access to Glasgow meant that the canal was never completed beyond Johnstone.

AS far as the planned Ardrossan end is concerned, I cannot remember if I was ever able to establish if construction had been started. There is a Canal Street in Saltcoats, but it is my guess that that name dates from an earlier canal that carried coal from the Stevenston pits. The intention would probably have been to integrate that into the Glasgow - Ardrossan enterprise.

[Aja]

Donald

Scary. As kids we used to play on all the carriages that were marshalled at Gower St just along the track - where the Gower St bridge went over to Bellahouston Acad. That would be early seventies though.

The Maxwell park pond was an overflow from the canal that went along St Andrew's Drive - or so I was told.

My great grandfather's Company started off making canal barges for the Paisley/Johnston canal.

I'll now have to have a look at this Aberdeenshire canal - my Dad is deepest darkest Aberdeen being born and bred in Torry......

Donald

[Telo]

Donald,

Perhaps the barge in the marshalling yards was one of your great grandfather's. I suppose all that old stuff would have been bulldozed away when the electrification and modernisation happened - 70s? It was dangerous though - shunting engines would suddenly shove long lines of carriages or trucks which (as far as I remember) would freewheel into sidings. They had brakemen walking alongside them, so we always kept clear in case we were caught. We also frequented the steam engine sheds at Corkerhill, where they would shovel out the coal ash, and get them ready for the next day's work.

Hadn't heard that about the Maxwell Park pond but I can still recall its smell on my clothes from my occasional accidents while trying to catch baggie minnows.....

Donald

[Ocklepoint]

What a great website.

As a bit of a canal nerd myself I must confess to having been to Canal Place in Inverurie on a canal search.

I suspect this maybe the canal that others have referred to.

Sadly, perhaps the most interesting bit of Victorian engineering on the Scottish canals, the double inclined plane on the Monklands Canal is now completely lost

Another curiosity in Scottish canal history is the so called "Mid Scotland Ship Canal" a rather grandiose suggestion from before the First World War to build a canal capable of taking battleships between the Forth and Clyde via Loch Lomond. Our very own Kiel Canal.

[Telo]

I suspect this maybe the canal that others have referred to.

That's the one. I had contemporary maps showing the canal. Don't know what happened to the maps and papers I had had accumulated; probably went with the rest of the "stuff" when my late mother's house was cleared. Shame really.

Funnily enough, I'm presently reading Robert Jeffrey's biography of Johnny Ramensky, who lived in Eglinton Steet, close to where that canal terminated. I remember people on the No3 tram pointing out his flat as we trundled along that street, such was his fame.

[Mark]

By chance I had a poke about the remains of the Portsmouth and
Arundel Canal in the spring:

http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set= ... 8f3&type=1