Workshop, BWB Bulbourne Yard, Grand Union Canal

Image: © Jo and Steve Turner Taken: 30 May 1999

Lock gates for the Grand Junction Canal were constructed at Paddington. However it was decided in 1847 it would be better to build nearer to where they were needed. The workshop, which dates from 1882, was probably to a design by Hubert Thomas (1839-1916), the Grand Junction Canal Company's long-serving civil engineer and later General Manager. A steam engine was used to raise water from a borehole in the yard into a tank in the tower, which acted as a reservoir for the boilers of the two steam engines that drove the workshop machinery. The steam-powered main drive shaft was replaced in 1893 by electric power. In 2003, British Waterways transferred this work to their workshops at Bradley and Stanley Ferry. The buildings were deteriorating and the Canal and River Trust invited suggestions to save the buildings. The consequential development was for 25 new homes and an office for the C&RT. (In 1927 the Grand Junction Canal was bought by the Regent's Canal Company and, since 1 January 1929, has formed the southern half of the Grand Union Main Line).

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