304 History of Inland Transport 



with its mountains and valleys, and hills and dales, presents 

 a wholly different problem, in the matter of canal con- 

 struction, from that offered by the flat surfaces of France, 

 of Holland, of Belgium or of North Germany. In 230 miles of 

 waterway between Hamburg and Berlin there are three locks. 

 In this country there is an average of one lock for every mile 

 and a quarter of canal navigation. The total number of locks 

 is 2,377, an d f r each of these there must be. allowed a 

 capitalised cost of, on an average, 1360. 



The fate that overtook the once prosperous canals of South 

 Wales when the railways could no longer be suppressed by the 

 canal companies, and were allowed to compete fairly with 

 them, has been materially due to their own physical dis- 

 advantages in respect of the large number of locks they require 

 to overcome the steep inclines of the mountainous district 

 in which they were made. These facts are brought out 

 in the Fourth (Final) Report of the Royal Commission on 

 Canals and Waterways, where it is said : 



" The Glamorganshire and Aberdare Canals were bought 

 by the Marquis of Bute in 1885. They form a continuous 

 narrow waterway with a total length of about 32 miles. In 

 this distance there are 53 locks. . . . The waterway is used 

 at the Cardiff end by small coasting vessels, but above this 

 point the traffic has fallen off considerably. The total tonnage 

 carried on the canals amounted in 1888 to 660,364 tons ; in 

 1905 to 249,760 tons. Two railways run parallel to the canals 

 and carry almost all the coal brought down from the collieries 

 near the canals. The gradients from these collieries to the 

 port are considerable. This makes the haulage of full railway 

 trucks easy, and, on the other hand, in the case of the canal 

 makes necessary a great number of locks relatively to the 

 mileage, with consequent slowness of transport. 



" The Swansea Canal belongs to the Great Western Railway 

 Company. It is a narrow canal, i6| miles in length, and has 

 36 locks. The traffic has diminished . . . for reasons similar 

 to those given with respect to the Glamorganshire Canal." 



Much more, however, than the provision of locks was 

 necessitated by the physical conditions of a country naturally 

 unsuited for artificial waterways. In some instances the 

 canals were taken across broad valleys by means of viaducts 

 designed to allow of the waterway being maintained at the same 



