Wave Wall, Water Ladder, And Attached Buildings

SD 96 SW & SD 95 NW 1298-/1/10000

FLASBY WITH WINTERBURN HETTON WINTERBURN RESERVOIR Wave wall, water-ladder, and attached buildings

II

Wave wall with valve tower and bridge, water-ladder, low level outlet, weir and gauging house. c1885-1893 by Henry Rofe and Edward Filliter, Civil Engineers of Leeds. Wave wall running east-west is c 175m long with an average height of 1 3m. Constructed of rock-faced, coursed stone with ashlar copings rising to a point. Wall incorporates a built out valve tower with two cast iron valve capstans. At east end of wall is a twin-arched bridge with rusticated abutments, central pier and voussoirs to arches. Returns to south each have a Gibbsian niche with rusticated quoins set in ashlar walling. End piers are rusticated with pyramidal caps. Bridge parapets are rock-faced above an ashlar string. Bridge crosses spillway which includes to north a semi-circular, stepped weir and to south a grand water-ladder stepping down reservoir dam on a curving plan. Water-ladder is c70 m long, ashlar paved and stepped, and walled with rock-faced stonework with crow-stepped copings. Walling includes a pair of intermediate piers and a pair of end piers, both rusticated, with pyramidal caps. Adjoining at south-west comer, a low-level valve tower outlet of stone with a rusticated Gibbsian circular portal. To south linked by low stone walling, a stone control weir and a gauging house on a plinth; a square, rock-faced building with a pyramidal slate roof, a single chimney stack and rectangular windows. An unusual and outstanding example of a canal reservoir being given architectural treatment. Built to serve the Leeds and Liverpool Canal. (Part lies in Hetton civil parish).

Listing NGR: SD9442559979