ways to withdraw much traffic from canals. Some
canals and river navigations have consequently become derelict, or are
only maintained with difficulty and in imperfect condition. The inland
navigation system suffers from a want of uniformity in the size of
locks, depth of water, width of channels and other arrangements, so
that direct intercommunication between one canal and another is often
impossible in consequence; moreover, although the canals, like
railways, are owned by many separate bodies, hardly any provision has
been made, as it has in the case of railways, for such facilities as
the working of through traffic over various systems at an inclusive
charge. Lastly, the railway companies themselves have acquired control
of about 30% of the total mileage of canals in England and Wales, and
in many cases this has had a prejudicial effect on the prosperity of
canals. Notwithstanding these disabilities, there has been in modern
times a new development in the trade of some canals, born of a
realization that for certain classes of goods water-transport is
cheaper than the swifter rail-transport. Various proposals have been
made for the establishment of a single control over all inland
waterways.

The lower or estuarine courses of some of the English rivers as the
Thames, Tyne, Humber, Mersey and Bristol Avon, are among the most
important waterways in the world, as giving access for seaborne
traffic to great ports. From the Mersey the Manchester Ship Canal runs
to Manchester. The manufacturing districts of South Lancashire and the
West Riding of Yorkshire are traversed and connected by several canals
following transverse valleys of the Pennine Chain. The main line of
the Aire and Calder navigation runs from Goole by Castleford to Leeds,
whence the Leeds and Liverpool canal, running by Burnley and
Blackburn, completes the connexion between the Humber and the Mersey.
Other canals are numerous, among which may be mentioned the Sheffield
and South Yorkshire, connecting Sheffield with the Trent. The Trent
itself affords an extensive navigation, from which, at Derwent mouth,
the Trent and Mersey Canal runs near Burton and Stafford, and through
the Potteries, to the Bridgewater Canal and so to the Mersey. This
canal is owned by the North Staffordshire railway company. The river
Weaver, a tributary of the Mersey, affords a waterway of importance to
the salt-