Huddersfield Narrow Canal

This canal was abandoned by the London Midland & Scottish Railway (LMRS) in a 1944 Act of Parliament but was included in a six week IWA cruise the northern canals which started in August 1948. Robert Aickman had hired the Ailsa Craig from R H Wyatt at Stone and was accompanied by Elizabeth Jane Howard. Also on part the trip were James and Anthea Sutherland and Angela and Tom Rolt. All six people undertook the trip on the Huddersfield Narrow canal and the passage through Standedge Tunnel what was probably the last complete crossing of the canal before its restoration in 2001.

In 1948 IWA Bulletin 16 stated that IWA had been officially informed the canal had been transferred from the Control of the Railway Executive to the control of the Docks & Inland Waterways Executive.

In 1951 Concrete staunches were installed on the abandoned Huddersfield Narrow Canal thus preventing any further attempts at navigation.

In March 1955 the Board of Survey reported and recommended the disposal of 771 miles of waterway including some canals like the Huddersfield Narrow Canal and the Barnsley Canal that had already been abandoned and closed to traffic. These "Group 3" waterways also included the Ashton, Peak Forest, Macclesfield, Bridgwater and Taunton, Chesterfield, Cromford, Dearne and Dove, Erewash, Forth & Clyde, Grand Western, Grantham, Kennet & Avon, Lancaster, Manchester, Bolton & Bury, Monmouthshire & Brecon, Nottingham, Oxford (southern section), Pocklington, Ripon, Llangollen, Montgomery, Stratford-upon-Avon (southern section), Swansea and Edinburgh & Glasgow Union canals as well as the River Witham.

In response IWA advocate a National Waterway Conservancy to look after all our waterways and point out that it is cheaper to restore and use waterways than to eliminate them.

In 1973 with the Kennet & Avon Canal still not restored after more than 10 years some IWA members were now suggesting that the Huddersfield Narrow Canal and Rochdale Canal should be considered next for restoration. Others said that this was too ambitious, an argument history would refute some thirty years later.

The Huddersfield Canal Society was formed on 18 April 1974 to conserve the Broad Canal and to promote the restoration of the Narrow Canal. In the IWA Waterways of April 1977 the Society highlighted four cases where the line of the canal had been obstructed by building and asked for support in opposing another application to build over the canal route. Some 4,000 people attended the 1977 Huddersfield Canal Festival.

In the Autumn 1978 edition of IWA Waterways Restoration Close-up featured the canal and included this photograph of a working party at the first lock in September 1997.

The first mention of the Huddersfield Narrow Canal in the Waterways ever expanding Restoration Round-Up feature was in the April 1980 edition, which reported that the West Yorkshire County Council might support restoration. By the end of the year the Huddersfield Canal Society had registered as a charity and leased the Tunnel End Cottages at Marsden. The cottages were restored and infill was removed from Dungebooth Lock during 1981.

In 1983 it was recognised that the Canal Society was winning its case for restoration against all expectations. This was a canal with many obstacles to overcome including 74 derelict locks. Now it was talked of as one of the top ten canal restoration projects.

Lock clearing and rebuilding continued in 1984 and 1985 the year a £100,000 engineering study of Standedge Tunnel financed by British Waterways, Greater Manchester Council, West Yorkshire County Council, the IWA and others.

Steady progress in restoring the canal continued into the 1990s and in 1995 the IWA National Trailboat Festival was held at Linthwaite on the Huddersfield Narrow Canal. By 1996 most of the 21 mile canal had been restored using various grants and local authority support. What remained to be done was a small number of very expensive engineering tasks to overcome, including the lengths of the canal that had been infilled and built over.

Early in 1997 the Millennium Commission announced a grant of £14.8 million with matching funding from English Partnerships to complete the restoration of the canal. British Waterways (BW) invited tenders for three large contracts in 1998. These were for £5 million of repairs and improvements to Standedge Tunnel, a new channel through Bates and Sellers factories in Huddersfield and the reconstruction of the canal through Slaithwaite.

Early in 2001 BW were testing taking trains of boats through Standedge Tunnel using electric tugs. On the 1 May 2001 the canal was reopened.