N < DISCOVERDISCOVER The Chiltern Canal Corridor Marsworth – Kings LangLey N < TRING –TRING BERKHAMSTED – BERKHAMSTED – HEMEL– HEMEL HEMPSTEAD N < he Bulbourne River with the Gade, which it joins at Two Waters, Hemel Hempstead, is one of a small number of low-level Troutes through the Chiltern Hills. It has always provided a connection from London to the north. The completion in 1792 of the Sparrow’s Herne Turnpike Trust road linking Bushey and Aylesbury meant Berkhamsted could boast ‘London in a day and reasonable tolls’! In 1798 the Grand Junction Canal was completed, followed in 1838 by the London & Birmingham Railway. Billet Lane FootbridgeFootbridgeLower KingsCastle RoadCastle Street Street Billet Lane Footbridge Footbridge Lower Kings Road The Warehouse at Castle Wharf (1799) The Ovaltine factory started production at was originally used by a succession Kings Langley in 1913. The company had its of boat builders, from Peacock & Originally a coal wharf serving Hemel own wharf and boats for coal and raw Willets in 1802 to Costins until before Hempstead, the site of the B&Q store was Bulbourne drydock is adjacent to materials. Their model farms provided eggs the First World War. The ground floor the last trading wharf in Dacorum. Roses Tring Summit top lock and opposite and milk for the barley-based drink. The was used for stabling working canal used the wharf to handle casks of lime the entrance to the Wendover Canal, egg farm building on the hill overlooking horses. The first floor winch served to juice imported through London Docks and which is currently being restored. This the canal, railway and factory became a unload timber from wide boats destined for their factory in St. Albans. They waterway was home to Bushell’s boat- local landmark and a nationally known delivering from London docks. This took their last delivery from boats operated building yard and Heygate’s flour mill. image, but like the factory it has now been section of the canal was the centre of by Tam and Di Murrell in 1981. redeveloped. the Port of Berkhamsted. Colourful bridge signs, painted by Phil Speight, represent traditional canal-boat decoration and draw attention to Berkhamsted’s key role in the canal era. Near the southern boundary of Dacorum, the M25 viaduct crosses the valley, canal and railway close to the site of Ovaltine’s former At appropriate points along the canal canal-side factory and provides through Berkhamsted, interpretation a 21st. century link with historic plinths point to aspects of historical The Tring Reservoirs were built north/south routes. between 1802 and 1839 to provide and local interest. They emphasise water for the canal at its 365ft summit. the important link between the town They are a stopping point for boaters and its waterways. Children can do The 16th. century Three Horseshoes and attract a great variety of permanent brass-rubbing of traditional canal-boat inn at Winkwell has, over time, features with follow-up activities and been expanded and changed but still and migratory bird life. There is a Berkhamsted’s totem pole, carved in British a young person’s questionnaire on the provides an attractive resting place for nature trail for walkers to follow, and Columbia, reminds us of the long-standing Town Council website, boaters, walkers and motorists. It is as the sun sets you can make your link between a succession of canal-side www.berkhamsted.gov.uk. adjacent to the now electrically way to one of a number of canal-side timber and boat-building yards close to this operated Winkwell canal swing bridge. watering holes. site and suppliers in western Canada. n becoming the third USEFUL INFORMATION ODuke of Bridgewater in 1767, Francis Thomas Berkhamsted Town Council FISHING Egerton inherited Ashridge The Civic Centre If you would like to fi sh the water- House in Berkhamsted. 161 – 163 High Street ways: In 1776 the canal linking Berkhamsted, Herts HP4 3HD From Hunton Bridge to Tring Tel: 01442 228945 (bridge 135) his coal mines at Worsley www.berkhamsted.gov.uk London Anglers Association to Manchester was a bold Izaak Walton House experiment which initiated a Tring Town Council 2a Hervey Park Road London E17 6LJ period of canal mania, peaking in 1793. The Duke became The Market House 61 High Street Tel: 0208 520 7477 known as ‘the Father of British inland waterways’. A national Tring, Herts HP23 4AB www.londonanglers.net memorial to him and his achievements is on Berkhamsted Tel: 01442 823347 Common. www.tring.gov.uk From Tring station to Pitstone or on the Wendover or Aylesbury Arms, The need to link London with the rapidly expanding Dacorum Borough Council with discounts at Tring Reservoirs: industrial regions of the Midlands resulted in a survey of Marlowes The Tring Anglers several possible canal routes. The eventual choice was from Hemel Hempstead, Herts HP1 1DT P.O. Box 1947 Fenny Stratford to the Tring Summit and downwards, following Tel: 01442 234222 Tring, Herts HP23 5LZ www.dacorum.gov.uk www.tringanglers.org.uk the Bulbourne, Gade and Colne valleys through Berkhamsted, Hemel Hempstead and Langleybury to Watford, Uxbridge and Marsworth Bulbourne, Tring and Northchurch Concerns about the waterways the Thames at Brentford. should be addressed to: The Canal Enabling Act (1793) gave adjacent landowners British Waterways This leafl et was produced by CARP and published by the Berkhamsted At Marsworth the Grand Union Canal turns northward as it leaves Tring gave its name to an impressive feat of canal engineering, a cut- The extensive zoological collection of Walter Rothschild was 64 Clarendon Road rights to trade and navigation. Work started on the Grand Watford, Herts WD17 1DA Community Partnership 08/2010 Junction Canal (later Grand Union) and was completed Dacorum. In this area the Grand Union was joined by the Aylesbury ting one and a half miles in length with a depth of 30 feet, appearing bequeathed to the Natural History Museum in 1892. It is now a Tel: 01923 201200 © CARP 2010 to Berkhamsted in 1798, Tring the following year and to and Wendover Canal arms. Bulbourne was the location of a major deeper because the excavated material was piled alongside. This fascinating musem open to the public. It has a unique fl ea www.britishwaterways.co.uk Photography © CWP Birmingham in 1805. waterways maintenance yard where lock gates and paddle gear were waterway cutting is 365 feet above sea level, the same height as the collection – all the exhibits are fully clothed. Environmental concerns should be made and maintained for generations. The workshops’ attractive top of St. Paul’s Cathedral. The town itself is at the crossing of the Problems of water supply at the Tring Summit resulted addressed to: in the construction of the Wendover Arm and the Wilstone, Italianate architectural features were worthy of listing but the now prehistoric Icknield Way and Roman Akeman Street. It is some way The church of St. Mary gave a name to a parish and settlement Enviroment Agency Marsworth, Tringford and Startops End reservoirs, which now disused site is still awaiting redevelopment. Restoration work on the from the canal and its railway station. Tring has been a market town when in 1222 it became the ‘Northchurch’ to Berkhamsted’s St. Apollo Court provide valuable wildlife sanctuaries. They constitute another Wendover Arm is well worth seeing. since 1315. Tring Park became one of the homes of the Rothschild Peter’s. The Compass Point development was once the site of the 2 Bishops Square Business Park St. Albans Road West aspect of the waterway’s recreational value. family in 1872 and is now a school. Compasses public house, which provided overnight stabling for Hatfi eld, Herts AL10 9EX The canal was a vital catalyst for local industry attracting canal horses. A nearby butcher’s shop, used by canal boatmen’s Tel: 01707 632300 timber yards, paper mills, grain and animal feed mills, food wives while their husbands worked the lock, gave Northchurch www.environment-agency.gov.uk www.berkhamstedcommunitypartnership.co.uk processing, gas works, chemical industries, boat building and lock the name Sheep’s Head Lock. For more and varied information repair yards. about the waterways: The London and Birmingham railway broadly followed Waterscape www.waterscape.com the same route as the canal but did not impact as strongly on industrial location in the district. Under the canal towpath a Inland Waterways Association recently installed fi bre-optic communications link will have Moor Road even less infl uence locally. Chesham, Bucks HP5 1WA The canal refl ects Dacorum’s heritage and still provides a Tel: 01494 783453 www.waterways.org.uk vital artery through the district for recreational boaters. It is a scenic and valuable amenity for local people. Discover for If you would like to holiday on the yourself that over the past two centuries little has changed; waterways you can hire from: there is nothing new but plenty to discover. Drifters Boating Holidays CANAL AND RIVERSIDE PARTNERSHIP Tel: 0845 7626 252 http://web.me.com/castlewharf/CANAL_AND_RIVERSIDE_PARTNERSHIP/Berkhamsted_Canal_and_Riverside_Partnership.html www.drifters.co.uk http://web.me.com/castlewharf/CANAL_AND_RIVERSIDE_PARTNERSHIP/Berkhamsted_Canal_and_Riverside_Partnership.html Berkhamsted Hemel Hempstead and Boxmoor Apsley and Kings Langley Of all the Chiltern towns there is in Berkhamsted a unique intimacy ‘Port of Berkhamsted’. The railway followed the canal and made Many think of Hemel Hempstead only as a new town, but Roman expansion outward in planned neighbourhoods. A new shopping and Kings Langley had royal connections, certainly from the 11th. century, between town, river and canal. It has the added distinction that Berkhamsted a commuter town. The town’s Canal and Riverside remains in Gadebridge Park and Norman features in St.