A navigation authority is a company or statutory body which is concerned with the management of a navigable canal or river.
Whilst the rights of individual authorities vary, a navigation authority will typically have a right to:
Again, responsibilities vary, but will usually include:
Whilst a navigation authority may own the land over which the waterway runs, and usually does in the case of artificial waterways, this is not invariably the case, and particularly in the case of river navigations, the land beneath the river may belong to riparian landowners.