Harbour and entrance to canal, view from east

Description Harbour and entrance to canal, view from east

Date 18/9/2001

Collection Records of the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland (RCAHMS), Edinbu

Catalogue Number E 15005 CN

Category Photographs and Off-line Digital Images

Copies SC 681724

Scope and Content Bowling Harbour Lock (Lock 40), Forth & Clyde Canal, West Dunbartonshire, from east This shows one of the four lock gates of Lock 40, built between 1846 and 1849, with Bowling Harbour in the background. The lock gates, late 20th-century replacements, have wooden decks with railings which allow people to cross when the gates are closed. There are 39 locks on the Forth & Clyde Canal and each one is almost 21m long and 6m wide with an average water rise of 2.4m. The boat would move into the centre of the lock and water would either be added or drained till the water level was at the desired level for the boat to continue its journey. The Forth & Clyde Canal was built between 1768 and 1790. It could have been completed sooner but funds ran out in 1777 and more money was not found by the government until 1784. John Smeaton (1724-92) was the designer and first chief engineer for the project. He was replaced in 1777 by Robert Mackell (d.1779), and in 1785 Robert Whitworth (1734-99) took over the building of the final section of the canal from Glasgow. When the canal was completed in 1790 it ran from the River Forth at Grangemouth, in the east, to Bowling on the River Clyde in the west of Scotland. The canal was linked to Edinburgh when the Union Canal was opened in 1822. The Forth & Clyde Canal was closed in 1963 and the Union Canal in 1965 and the construction of new roads meant that it was impossible for boats to travel along the full length of these watercourses. However, the £84.5m Millennium Link project enabled the canals to reopen in 2002. Source: RCAHMS contribution to SCRAN.

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