Wappenshall Junction

Wappenshall Junction
The junction in 1964. The route to Newport is through the bridge, the Trench Branch is to the upper right, and Shrewsbury to the left.
Specifications
Status	Closed
History
Date completed	1835
Date closed	1944

Wappenshall Junction (grid reference SJ662145) is a British canal junction located at Wappenshall, Shropshire. It was created when the Newport Branch Canal joined the Shrewsbury Canal in 1835, and was closed along with the canal in 1944.

The Shrewsbury Canal was authorised by an Act of Parliament in 1793, and was to run from the town of Shrewsbury to the Wombridge Canal, most of which was bought by the new canal company, to secure a link to the Donnington Wood Canal and the supplies of coal which were available there. The canal was level from Shrewsbury to Eyton, a little to the west of Wappenshall, where there were two locks. To the south-east of Wappenshall, it ascended through nine locks and then up an inclined plane at Trench, to reach the Wombridge Canal which was 75 feet (23 m) above the level of the canal at that point. It was opened in February 1797, as was suitable for tub-boats, which were 6.5 feet (2.0 m) wide, and nearly all the traffic through Wappenshall was coal towards Shrewsbury, with empty boats passing in the reverse direction.

The canal, which was part of the East Shropshire network, remained isolated from the rest of the British canal system. In 1825, the Birmingham and Liverpool Junction Canal was authorised, to run from the Ellesmere and Chester Canal at Nantwich to Autherley Junction near Wolverhampton on the Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal. Two years later, that canal company approached the Shrewsbury Canal about a possible link between Norbury and Wappenshall. However, they experienced severe engineering difficulties in building their main line, and no further action was taken until 1831, when Henry Williams, who was superintendent and engineer for the Shrewsbury Canal and also worked for the on the Birmingham and Liverpool Junction company, costed a project to make the Shrewsbury Canal suitable for standard 7-foot (2.1 m) narrow boats. In the event, only the two locks to the west of Wappenshall were widened, and specially-built boats were used on the Trench branch, which could negotiate the narrower locks. The new canal to Wappenshall Junction opened in 1835.