The Hay Inclined Plane is a

canal inclined plane An inclined plane is a type of cable railway used on some canals for raising boats between different water levels. Boats may be conveyed afloat, in caissons, or may be carried in cradles or slings. History Inclined planes have evolved over the ...

in the

Ironbridge Gorge The Ironbridge Gorge is a deep gorge, containing the River Severn in Shropshire, England. It was first formed by a glacial overflow from the long drained away Lake Lapworth, at the end of the last ice age. The deep exposure of the rocks cut t ...

Shropshire Shropshire (; alternatively Salop; abbreviated in print only as Shrops; demonym Salopian ) is a landlocked historic county in the West Midlands region of England. It is bordered by Wales to the west and the English counties of Cheshire to th ...

, with a height of . It was located at the end of the

Shropshire Canal The Shropshire Canal was a tub boat canal built to supply coal, ore and limestone to the industrial region of east Shropshire, England, that adjoined the River Severn at Coalbrookdale. It ran from a junction with the Donnington Wood Canal ascend ...

, part of a network of canals that linked the industrial region of east Shropshire with the

River Severn , name_etymology = , image = SevernFromCastleCB.JPG , image_size = 288 , image_caption = The river seen from Shrewsbury Castle , map = RiverSevernMap.jpg , map_size = 288 , map_c ...

. The inclined plane was in operation from 1793 to 1894. It can be visited as part of the

Blists Hill Victorian Town Blists Hill Victorian Town is an open-air museum built on a former industrial complex located in the Madeley area of Telford, Shropshire, England. The museum attempts to recreate the sights, sounds and smells of a Victorian Shropshire town ...

and is also a waypoint on the

South Telford Heritage Trail The South Telford Heritage Trail is a circular, waymarked walking route that passes by forty-nine heritage sites in the English town of Telford. The route The trail begins and ends in Telford Town Park and passes through the parishes of Stirc ...

History

The proprietors of the Shropshire Canal held a competition in 1788 to find the best means of raising and lowering heavy weights between the canal and the river Severn. They selected a design by Henry Williams and James Loudon, which was also used at a number of other inclined planes in east Shropshire. Construction of the Hay inclined plane was completed in 1793. By 1820 it was in poor condition and substantial repairs were needed. Further repairs were also carried out in the 1840s.Ironbridge Gorge Museum information boards In 1857 the Hay inclined plane was taken over by the

London and North Western Railway The London and North Western Railway (LNWR, L&NWR) was a British railway company between 1846 and 1922. In the late 19th century, the L&NWR was the largest joint stock company in the United Kingdom. In 1923, it became a constituent of the Lo ...

. The following year the LNWR closed the Shropshire canal between the Wrockwardine Wood and Windmill inclined planes, leaving only a short section of canal to serve the industrial area of

Blists Hill Blists Hill Victorian Town is an open-air museum built on a former industrial complex located in the Madeley area of Telford, Shropshire, England. The museum attempts to recreate the sights, sounds and smells of a Victorian Shropshire town ...

. In 1861 they opened the

Coalport branch line The Coalport branch line was a standard gauge London and North Western Railway branch line in Shropshire, England, which ran between Hadley Junction near Oakengates on the Stafford to Shrewsbury line and a terminus at Coalport East railway sta ...

from

Wellington Wellington ( mi, Te Whanganui-a-Tara or ) is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the second-largest city in New Zealand by me ...

Coalport Coalport is a village in Shropshire, England. It is located on the River Severn in the Ironbridge Gorge, a mile downstream of Ironbridge. It lies predominantly on the north bank of the river; on the other side is Jackfield. The settlement was ...

which passed underneath the Hay inclined plane near Coalport. The last recorded use of the Hay inclined plane was thought to be in 1894 and it was formally closed in 1907. It was restored in 1968 and again in 1975, including the reinstatement of rails, as part of the creation of the Ironbridge Gorge Museums.

Operation

The

used box-shaped

tub boat A tub boat was a type of unpowered cargo boat used on a number of the early English and German canals. The English boats were typically long and wide and generally carried to of cargo, though some extra deep ones could carry up to . They a ...

s long with a load capacity of 5 tons. Twin railway tracks were laid down the incline. The tub boats ascended and descended the

inclined plane An inclined plane, also known as a ramp, is a flat supporting surface tilted at an angle from the vertical direction, with one end higher than the other, used as an aid for raising or lowering a load. The inclined plane is one of the six clas ...

on wheeled cradles which ran on the rails. At the bottom of the incline the rails went underwater allowing the cradle to become submerged and the tub boat to either float free or be floated into position. At the top of the incline the rails also started under water then climbed a short slope out of the water to the top of the incline. In operation an empty boat would be loaded into the bottom cradle and a full boat would be loaded into the top cradle. A rope would be attached to the loaded top cradle and it would be drawn out of the water to the top of the incline using a small winding drum driven by a steam engine. The main incline rope would then be attached to the cradle and the loaded boat would descend the incline, counterbalanced by an empty boat ascending on the other rail line. The speed would be controlled by a brake on the main winding drum. On reaching the summit a rope from the small winding drum would be attached to the cradle to control its descent into the upper basin. Although the loaded boats were travelling downhill, and so the plane was mostly worked by gravity, a small steam engine was also provided and drove the winding drums. This was of Adam Heslop's design, a twin-cylindered

rotative beam engine A beam engine is a type of steam engine where a pivoted overhead beam is used to apply the force from a vertical piston to a vertical connecting rod. This configuration, with the engine directly driving a pump, was first used by Thomas Newc ...

, to a design patented in 1790. The remains of the brick boiler house and winding mechanism may be seen at the top of the incline. The system was worked by four men and took around four minutes to raise or lower a boat. Image:hay_inclined_plane_s.jpg Image:Hays inclined plane 3, Ironbridge, UK.JPG, Top of the incline, showing original-pattern bridge rail. The normal water level is shown by the extent of the staining on the wallthe

Bing Maps Bing Maps (previously Live Search Maps, Windows Live Maps, Windows Live Local, and MSN Virtual Earth) is a web mapping service provided as a part of Microsoft's Bing suite of search engines and powered by the Bing Maps Platform framework. Since 20 ...

overhead photograph (accessible through "coordinates", above) shows the water at a higher level and covered in bright green weed Image:Coalport Hay Plane.jpg, Coalport Canal at the bottom of the plane

References

External links

* * * * {{Ironbridge Gorge Museums Telford and Wrekin Buildings and structures in Shropshire Canal inclined planes Ironbridge Gorge Canals in Shropshire

History

Operation

See also

Further reading

References

External links