Liverpool

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The original terminus of the Leeds & Liverpool Canal in Liverpool was around Old Hall Street. The canal passed under the road to a basin on the river-side. Clarkes Basin, built 1792 and closed in 1886, was the closest link the canal had to the dock system until the Stanely Dock branch was built in 1846. Cargo would have to be transhipped from boat to wagon and then taken to the docks. All that remains of the former canal basin is a small brick building, now dwarfed by the hotel and tower block behind it. This was once a coopers yard. The canal is also remembered in the street names: Old Leeds Street and Leeds Street. This area is now the business centre of Liverpool with many insurance companies and the headquarters of the Liverpool Echo nearby.

To accommodate the expansion of the railways part of the canal was in filled in 1886 leaving Clarke's Basin stranded and unused. The canal between  the "New Basin" (just south of the Chisenhale Street bridge) and the Philips Street coal yards basin was re-built, it was straightened and moved about 50 meters east. The Pall Mall Warehouses were built along side, with new canal offices.  The canal went right up to the warehouses to allow cargo to be loaded/unloaded directly. Large doors allowed goods wagons access to the warehouses from the new Pall Mall road. The other side of the basin was taken up with coal yards and the council rubbish incinerator, there were arms off the basin for loading and unloading.

The company headquaters were damaged during World War Two, the paper work was moved to company offices elsewhere and the canal was run from a house in nearby Formby. There was also a mission for canal workers at the terminus which gave the bargemen somewhere to be educated and even practice rifle shooting.

The terminus basin was filled in up to Chisenhale Street in the 1960s. The once open side of the warehouses was bricked up. The basin is now a car park and the arms have been built on. Some warehousing was demolished when Leeds Street was widened.

In 1978 a local housing group from Eldonian Street were told they were to be re-housed and the community split up. They protested and the Eldonian Village plan was created. The area was cleared of its housing and industrial buildings. The demolition of the Tate and Lyle refinery as shown in the Boys from the Black Stuff marked the end of the canal as an industrial feature. The canal was shortened yet again this time to just north of bridge B Burlington street bridge. The Eldonian Basin was created with the Eldonian Village Hall and sports centre. www.eldonians.org.uk A new bridge was built to give access to the housing estate as part of Phase II of the regeneration. This new bridge, Vauxhall Bridge was opened by former local Cilla Black.

It was always planned that the Leeds & Liverpool Canal should have a direct link to the docks and the River Mersey. The Stanley Dock branch of the canal was added in 1846 when the expansion of the railway disrupted the canals original route to Old Hall Street and the Princes Dock area. The four locks on this branch are large enough to allow the Liverpool flats access to the canal. It is from this terminus that the canal link will join canal to the South Docks. The locks were designed and supervised by Jesse Hartley, the stone work is typical of Hartley's docks. The original plan was to have the country's (and world's) first integrated dock, canal and railway depot. Instead two warehouses were built where the docks would have been. In 1900 the large tabacco warehouse was built on half of Stanley Dock. Liverpool's Collingwood Dock is reached via Stanley Dock.