Canals around Coventry

The Canal basin filmed on 9 July 2021

Thank you for the tour Brother J. I have never seen that before.

A walk along the tow path from the Canal Basin to Bridge 3 (Foleshill Road). Showing some of the wildlife, art installations, new street art and glimpses of the developments near the canal. The former City Engineers site only had a few houses on it last time I was up that way and the former Courtaulds building at the end of the video was derelict and hadn't been redeveloped. Enjoy

Heathite, Many books have been written on the industry of Coventry, but none on the biggest hive of industry in Coventry for over a century. The Canal. That short piece of ground known as Leicester Row was the home of a work force of probably sixty or so men and a score of horses. The pubs close together held friendly rivalry of scores of men, each belonging to their own group, The principal heavy traffic into the city was from the trollies and goods carts, there were also carriers of these goods to various villages, who stayed at the various pubs. There were the water carts which supplied the water for daily use, the likes of Frank Crab, Billy Tibbits, Short-arm Johnson and Bacco Westwick. The carts, being barrels on wheels, held from 100 to 130 gallons, let out of a large tap into buckets, sold at half-penny a bucket. Coal, sand, treacle, warps, soap, wood, iron - there was no end to the type of goods brought into the city. A few minutes between some boats and the men would snatch a quick half in the pub. Stables to house a score or so horses, hay, corn, barrows of muck, everything to do with the city came through this tiny area which saw it all, and all by the friendly tread of those horses that towed the boats up and down the country.

Hi Kaga, there's some interesting social history in your post. Piecing it together, I can put myself there. That area around Leicester Row and Leicester street still has its own atmosphere.

Thank you, Heathite, The trams must have added to the excitement in their day, but it all stopped in 1927 when the Craven pit closed, and Sutton Stop closed the canal from there to the Coventry basin. The Wyken basin closed also.

The Great Breach of Friday 15th December 1978. During that day workmen had been excavating very close to the embankment and towpath of the canal. About 10pm, the breach occurred. At that point, there was nothing to stop what became a wall of water 6ft high, 20ft wide and 39miles long (plus the Ashby Canal) from pouring across the construction site, Foleshill Road and down Eagle Street and eventually over a mile away! Live, very high voltage, electric cables stretched across the gap in the towpath. It was not until 6 hours later that British Waterways Board put stop-planks in at Hawkesbury Junction, but that still left 5 miles of water free to leave the canal at the breach. A little later, further stop-planks were put in at Cash's Lane bridge. An estimated 25,000,000 gallons of water were lost from the canal system. The empty basin over the weekend: The breach site showing poles supporting the electric cables:

20A-Manor House, Great shots. Past my time or my father's time, couldn't see that happening in the days of the lengthmen and the canal houses.

Coventry Canal, Drapers Fields - 24 Jan 2010 Alongside Leicester Row (right)

Coventry Canal, Red Lane - 17 Jun 2010 Looking towards Bridge No 5

"The Great Breach of Friday 15th December 1978." My uncle lived at the very bottom of Eagle Street and I have this very clear childhood memory of being taken round his house after this 'flood' - very vivid memories of all the mud that had engulfed all of his downstairs rooms. The place was a complete mess, very distressing for him! I was too young to fully understand what had happened, so I'm grateful to learn of the circumstances.

OddSock. When the canal was Inland Waterways, it had a lengthsman that travelled his length every day inspecting for any trouble. He lived in a tied cottage. Foleshill fire station had a large warehouse fire close to that spot in the fifties, they threw in huge suction hose for the fire from the canal, and trampled and weakened the bank. This was reported to Hillmorton, I believe, but as it was being turned over to the pleasure boats it got lost in the deal, and the pleasure boats never used lengthsmen, so you had a leakage.

The 1978 breach happened because the canal bank was weakened by the digging of footings for new industrial buildings in Foleshill Rd almost opposite to the Eagle Street junction. The plans had almost certainly been submitted by an architect and approved by the developers, the council, and British Waterways, all worked out with fancy drawings and calculations. Kaga's point is very valid because in times gone by there would have been a lengthsman who could actually see how the work was progressing on a daily basis and who would certainly have used his skill and experience to warn of any potential danger. The actual breach occurred late in the evening when the building site was empty so the first anyone knew was when the tidal wave of water swept down Eagle Street and down the hill towards the hospital and Swanswell Pool. I was trying to drive home to Bedworth and found that both Foleshill Rd and Stoney Stanton Rd were closed and I ended up diverting through Hillfields and Swan Lane.

We don't have a dedicated thread for Leicester Row so adding here as it's been mentioned several times and some of the canal buildings can be seen (though image is flipped the wrong way!). New one to me though.

Should look like this