Deep joy for canal tunnel

ACCOLADE... (from left) Colne Valley MP Jason McCartney, Stanedge visitor services manager James Dean, British Waterways heritage adviser Judy Jones, Rob Shorland-Ball and Peter Stone from Transport Trust

BRITAIN’S longest, deepest and highest canal tunnel is on a roll.

Stretching from Diggle to Marsden along the Huddersfield Narrow Canal — engineering wonder Stanedge Tunnel has been granted Red Wheel status.

Commemorating Britain’s rich and global legacy in the development of transport — The Red Wheel supplies explanatory markers for sites of significance. Fittingly, a special plaque has been unveiled by Colne Valley MP Jason McCartney, during the bicentennial year of the three-mile tunnel.

Judy Jones, heritage adviser for British Waterways, said: “Stanedge Tunnel is one of the finest examples of civil engineering on the waterways and an iconic site even after all these years.

“It’s amazing to think that visitors from all around the country are still able to take a trip deep into Stanedge Tunnel after the first boats went through over 200 years ago.”

Expected to be completed in six years, it was a decade extra before the tunnel’s eventual opening — which leads through the Pennines.

The canal company went bankrupt three times and almost gave up until Thomas Telford was brought in and convinced the canal company to complete the project.

The total cost of building the original tunnel was more than double the expected amount — totting up to £123,804!