Wave Wall, Water Ladder, And Attached Buildings

The wave wall, water ladder, and attached buildings at Winterburn Reservoir were constructed between 1885 and 1893 by civil engineers Henry Rofe and Edward Filliter from Leeds. The wave wall runs east-west and is approximately 175 meters long with an average height of 1.3 meters. It is made of rock-faced, coursed stone topped with ashlar copings that rise to a point. The wall features a built-out valve tower with two cast iron valve capstans. At the eastern end of the wall, there is a twin-arched bridge with rusticated abutments, a central pier, and voussoirs to the arches. Each return to the south has a Gibbsian niche with rusticated quoins set in ashlar walling, and the end piers are rusticated with pyramidal caps. The bridge parapets are rock-faced above an ashlar string and span a spillway that includes a semi-circular, stepped weir to the north and a grand water ladder to the south, which steps down the reservoir dam in a curving plan. The water ladder is about 70 meters long, paved with ashlar, and features stepped rock-faced stonework with crow-stepped copings. It includes a pair of rusticated intermediate piers and a pair of end piers, both capped with pyramids. Adjacent to the southwest corner is a low-level valve tower outlet made of stone, featuring a rusticated Gibbsian circular portal. To the south, a low stone wall links to a stone control weir and a gauging house on a plinth. The gauging house is a square, rock-faced building topped with a pyramidal slate roof, a single chimney stack, and rectangular windows. This site is an unusual and outstanding example of a canal reservoir that has been given architectural treatment, built to serve the Leeds and Liverpool Canal. Part of the structure lies within Hetton civil parish.