Slateford Aqueduct

The Slateford Aqueduct is a navigable aqueduct that carries the Union Canal over the Water of Leith at Slateford, Edinburgh, Scotland. Completed in 1822, it has eight arches and spans a length of 500 feet (150 m).

1. History

It was designed by Hugh Baird with advice from Thomas Telford and is modelled on Telford's Chirk Aqueduct. Different parts of the canal were tendered to contractors at different times, and the masonry for the Slateford Aqueduct was advertised to builders on 2 March 1818. Baird wrote to Telford regarding the ironwork, as he had received a visit from James Thomson, representing the company of William Hazledine, who had worked on the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct. Baird was unsure about using a contractor based so far away, and also as to whether the contract should just be for the delivery of the plates or the delivery and assembly. On 3 April 1818, Hugh McIntosh was chosen to construct the aqueduct, as he was the contractor for the east end of the canal. After Thomson sent an estimate to Telford for the iron on 30 April, a revised specification was chosen by Baird, the contract for which was advertised on 18 July, and tenders opened on 11 August. The offer by the partnership of Messrs. Craven, Whitaker and Nowell, riding on the success of their building a stone bridge over the River Ouse, was accepted as being "by far the most eligible." Construction had started by March 1819, after the laying of a foundation stone. It lasted until 1822, and the canal opened that year. It was listed as a category B listed building in 1970.

1. Design

The Barton Aqueduct of 1761, and subsequent canal aqueducts in the United Kingdom, used large quantities of masonry and puddling to obtain watertightness. After the success of The Iron Bridge in 1789, however, cast iron was used by Telford on aqueducts such as Chirk and Pontcysyllte. Aqueducts built in the early part of the 19th century use either puddle clay or an iron trough in no particular pattern. The Slateford Aqueduct has eight arches of 50 feet (15 m) span, and is 500 feet (150 m) long and 75 feet (23 m) high above the Water of Leith. The piers are battered, giving a larger footprint at the base than the top, and the spandrels are hollow, an innovation by Telford. The interior of the stone structure is essentially a set of 5/6? stone arches running in parallel along the length of the bridge, linked and braced laterally at the top of each arch. It is possible to walk the length of the bridge inside the stonework on the north side, from access apertures on the abutments. It carries the Union Canal across Inglis Green Road and the Water of Leith at Slateford. To the north of the aqueduct, on the side of the accessible towpath, is the parallel Slateford Viaduct, which carries an operational railway.

1. See also

List of canal aqueducts in Great Britain

1. References


1. External links

Slateford Aqueduct on the Canmore database Slateford Aqueduct at the National Transport Trust website Video footage of the aqueduct

Nearby Places View Menu

Edinburgh Corn Exchange

Edinburgh Corn Exchange is an events and concert venue located in New Market Road in Edinburgh, Scotland. The structure, which was commissioned as a corn exchange, is a Category B listed building.

Event Music

Slateford railway station

Slateford railway station is a railway station serving Slateford in the city of Edinburgh, Scotland. It is located on the Shotts Line from Glasgow Central to Edinburgh Waverley via Shotts. The station has two platforms, connected by a stairway footbridge, and CCTV. It is managed by ScotRail. It is currently served, Monday to Saturday, by one ScotRail service each hour from Glasgow Central to Edinburgh Waverley with a two-hourly Sunday service. There are also additional services, one from Motherwell to Edinburgh in the early morning with a late evening return and a morning peak service from Glasgow Central to Edinburgh via Carstairs, returning in the evening peak. The staple passenger traction calling at this station is the Class 385 Scotrail “Express” Electric Multiple Unit, however it is also served by Class 380 “Desiro” EMUs. As this station lies on the spur of the West Coast Main Line from Carstairs to Edinburgh, a variety of CrossCountry Class 220 Voyager, Avanti West Coast Class 221 Super Voyager, Class 390 Pendolino and London North Eastern Railway Class 801s are in use, and also Class 397 on TransPennine Express services. The line was and still is heavily used by freight, including imported coal from Ayrshire to Drax Power Station, a daily intermodal service, departmental traffic and a daily train of loaded steel to the Dalzell works at Motherwell. Freight trains normally avoid the centre of Edinburgh and the busy station complex at Waverley by using the link from here onto the Edinburgh Suburban Line at Craiglockhart Junction, which also gives access to the marshalling yard at Millerhill. There is also a crossover for access to Network Rail's Slateford Depot, which houses On Track Plant and Test Trains when they visit Edinburgh. When first opened by the Caledonian Railway in 1848, the line here ran through to a terminus known as Lothian Road. This was subsequently replaced by a larger depot at Edinburgh Princes Street in 1870, though it was more than twenty years thereafter before the station was fully completed. What is now the main line to the Edinburgh and Glasgow Railway at Haymarket (originally known as the Duff Street Spur) was opened by the Caledonian company in 1853 and the station along with it. The Caledonian had planned to use this link to access the E&G station at Haymarket and hence run through to Waverley, but it would be another century before this actually came to pass as agreement with the E&G over running powers couldn't be reached, forcing the Caledonian to develop its own terminus instead. The spur remained disused but intact until it was finally completed and commissioned in September 1964. All passenger services now use this line to reach Waverley, as services over the original route to Princes Street were withdrawn by British Railways on 6 September 1965. Goods traffic ended the following year and the track was then lifted. Much of the formation has been used for road improvements, though the former junction site can still be made out.

Industrial Landmark

556 m

Parkhead, Edinburgh

Parkhead is a residential area of Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland. It was one of the smallest wards in the Edinburgh City Council before a reorganisation into larger multi-member wards in 2007; since then it has been part of the Sighthill/Gorgie ward. Located about 4 miles (6.4 km) south-west of the city centre, the area was built in 1940s and contains low-rise houses, mainly in the cottage flat (four-in-a-block) format with Art Deco features and unique red roofs. Parkhead is bounded to the north by the A71 Calder Road (with the Fairbrae and Broomhouse neighbourhoods beyond), to the east by Longstone Road and a development at 'The Green' completed in 2021, to the west by Sighthill, and to the south by Murrayburn Road (opposite the Lothian Buses Longstone Depot, as well as the Murrayburn Depot which in 2019 has been secured for the future housing development of around 200 units).

Neighbourhood

582 m

Chesser, Edinburgh

Chesser ( CHEZ-ər) is a mainly residential suburb of Edinburgh, Scotland, east of the Water of Leith. It, with Longstone, is to the south-west, Allan Park and Craiglockhart to the south, Slateford, Hutchison and Moat to the east, and Gorgie Road to the north.

Neighbourhood