Coal and Stoppages.

Comes the autumn, a serious hint of winter chill in the air, it must be time to get a stock of coal in for the winter. When’s my regular coal boat coming again? Oh no! - too late again, the canals are closed for the winter stoppage season…Yes, I know I should have stocked up in the summer at summer prices, but is anybody really that sensible and efficient? And who spends money before they really need to - who can afford to? What a pity that just when someone could earn a reasonable living retailing coal from a canal boat the canal shuts down.

It was not always thus. Until thirty years ago there was a clearly defined stoppage season—the one week following Whitsun. The demand for fuel was at its lowest and the weather was nice (with luck). What a sensible time for the boats to tie up for a week and take a holiday at the same time that the pits were closed. With long daylight hours and a reasonable chance of fine weather the company workers could get in the overtime, and the annual maintenance work would be completed with a minimum of disruption to the all-important canal traffic, the trade that was ultimately earning everyone’s living.

A good time too for the boatwoman to empty the contents of the cabin out on to the towpath and stove the cabin against unwelcome insect neighbours, to scrub out all the cupboards and drawers to snowy whiteness and to do all the washing, secure in the knowledge that it would not all be covered in coal dust for at least a week. But that was the sunny side of the picture of course—at the poverty end of the boating business it was an enforced week without wages, another good money-earning week to add to those already lost to ice in the winter or to low water in a summer drought. Then there were the emergency stoppages, the acts of God unforeseeable by even the most prudent boatman, the landslip in the cutting or the burst embankment… Life was hard enough, so thank goodness the canal company did not need to close the waterway for three months of each year as well. Was this just luck or good planning?

Today, however, it is pleasure boats and hire companies that finance the waterways, and a weeks cruising time lost in the summer is fifty times more costly than one lost in the winter, so the struggling coal carrier has another problem to contend with. The enterprising boatman therefore has to take full advantage of the Christmas cruising ‘window’ in the winter stoppage season.

In the North-West John Jackson completed a marathon sales trip from his Midlands base on the Staffs and Worcester Canal, stocking up his customers on the Shropshire Union, Trent and Mersey and Macclesfield canals. Accompanied by Starling, skippered by Ian Braine, John successfully shifted over thirty five tons of fuel over his 190 mile round trip, a healthy traffic that could be repeated and increased every month if the canals were open. (Photos taken December 2001 at Middleport on the T & M.)

Yes, there’s a backlog of maintenance, but really - does it have to take three months closure in the winter to do what used to be done in one week in the summer?

Above 2 photos maintenance at Preston Brook Tunnel January 2002.  All images © Tony Lewery.

Tony Lewery, Preston Brook, Jan. ‘02
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