Stroudwater Navigation

Stroudwater Navigation
Nutshell Bridge on the Stroudwater Navigation
Specifications
Maximum boat length	70 ft 0 in (21.34 m)
Maximum boat beam	15 ft 6 in (4.72 m)
Locks	12 + 1 Stop lock (originally 13 + Stop lock)
Status	Active restoration project
Navigation authority	Stroud Valleys Canal Company
History
Original owner	Company of Proprietors of the Stroudwater Navigation
Principal engineer	John Priddy, Edmund Lingard
Date of act	1730, 1776
Date completed	1779
Date closed	1954
Date restored	2018 (Phase 1A), 2025 (Phase 1B, expected)
Geography
Start point	Wallbridge, near Stroud
End point	Framilode, River Severn
Connects to	River Severn (formerly), Gloucester and Sharpness Canal, Thames and Severn Canal

v t e Stroudwater Navigation
Legend
River Severn 13 Framilode Lock Framilode Basin Site of former Framilode Bridge The Ship Inn, Framilode Saul Bridge (former swing) Old Stroudwater, maintained as wetland Section infilled by flood defence bank 12 Junction Lock, conserved but not navigable Saul Junction, Glos & Sharpness Saul Junction Foot Bridge Dry Dock Saul Junction Marina Walk Bridge (fixed, low level) 11 Whitminster weir Whitminster feeder (culverted) Lock blocked by fixed low-level bridge 11 Whitminster Lock Combined river/canal channel (proposed) River Frome Original syphon aqueduct (destroyed) Site of former Stonepitts Bridge Bristol-Gloucester oil pipeline Occupation Bridge  A38  roundabout 10 Bristol Road Lock (under road) Hyde's Basin 10 New Bristol Road lock  M5  Bridge shared with River Frome 9a New Westfield Lock Westfield Bridge 9 John Robinson (Westfield) Lock Oldbury Brook aqueduct (new) 8 Dock Lock Pike Bridge, Eastington 7 Pike Lock Eastington Slipway 6 Blunder Lock 5 Newtown Lock Newtown Bridge Bond's Mill Bridge (inoperable) Ocean Jubilee Railway Bridge The Ocean Ocean Bridge Nutshell Bridge Stonehouse Bridge Upper Mills Bridge Skew Bridge (former railway, now NCN 45)  A419  Haywards road Bridge Ryeford Bridge Ryeford footbridge 3,4 Ryeford Double Lock Oil Mills Bridge Cloth Mills Bridge Ebley floodgate Ebley Mill footbridge Discharge to River Frome Hilly Orchard footbridge  A419  Dudbridge Road Bridge Bypass and turbine outlet 2 Dudbridge Lock + hydroelectric turbine Ruscombe Brook Lower bypass weir 1 Foundry Lock (Dudbridge upper) Upper bypass weir Chestnut Lane Bridge Strachan's Close Slipway Lodgemoor Lane Bridge Painswick Stream Thames and Severn Junction Wallbridge Wharf Thames and Severn Canal

The Stroudwater Navigation is a canal in Gloucestershire, England which linked Stroud to the River Severn. It was authorised in 1776, although part had already been built, as the proprietors believed that an Act of Parliament (3 Geo. 2. c. 13) obtained in 1730 gave them the necessary powers. Opened in 1779, it was a commercial success, its main cargo being coal. It was 8 miles (13 km) in length and had a rise of 102 ft 5 in (31.22 m) through 12 locks.^[1] Following the opening of the Thames and Severn Canal in 1789, it formed part of a through route from Bristol to London, although much of its trade vanished when the Kennet and Avon Canal provided a more direct route in 1810. Despite competition from the railways, the canal continued to pay dividends to shareholders until 1922, and was not finally abandoned until 1954.

Even before its closure, there was interest in retaining the canal for its amenity value. The Stroudwater Canal Society, which later became the Cotswold Canals Trust, was formed in 1972. Following initial hostility from the Proprietors, who had not been stripped of their powers when the canal had closed, agreement was reached and work began on restoration of the waterway. The project gained popularity, and in 2003, a bid was made to the Heritage Lottery Fund for £82 million to restore both the Stroudwater Navigation and the Thames and Severn Canal. The project had to be split into smaller parts, and only the first phase has so far been funded in this way, when a grant of £11.9 million was confirmed in 2006. With match funding, this enabled the section from 'The Ocean' at Stonehouse to Wallbridge to be reopened, together with the Wallbridge to Hope Mill section of the Thames and Severn.

A second bid to the Heritage Lottery Fund for the connection from Stonehouse to the Gloucester and Sharpness Canal at Saul was rejected in 2007. This section presented some engineering challenges, as it was severed by the construction of the M5 motorway and the A38 road. The roundabout where the A38 joins the A419 road was built over Bristol Road Lock, and part of the route was destroyed by flood relief work for the River Frome, while at Stonehouse, the bridge carrying the Bristol and Gloucester Railway had been replaced by a culvert. A bid to the newly formed Gloucestershire Local Transport Board for its reinstatement, and to create a long-distance footpath along the route was rejected, but in 2019 the Heritage Lottery Fund made a further grant of £8.9 million towards the section from Ocean to Saul. Highways England also made a grant of £4 million, to fund the construction of the canal under the A38 roundabout, and it is expected that the Stroud section will be linked to the national waterways network at Saul Junction by 2025. Outside the main restoration, the Cotswold Canals Trust is gradually restoring many of the other structures, with the ultimate goal of re-opening a link between the River Thames and the River Severn.