Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
football club's practice ground before mining subsidence. It has been given beaches of im-
ported sand and proves popular with 200 bird species.
At Longport (Bennett's Shawport) is the Grade II Georgian Duke of Bridgewater public
house, someone not directly involved with this canal. A bottle kiln remains among the build-
ings of the Middleport Pottery, where Burleigh's factory is open for tours. Davenport was set
up here in 1793.
At Burslem Junction the 600m Burslem Branch was closed in 1962 following a mining
collapse but there are restoration plans. Festival Waters is a 16ha redevelopment site from
Middleport to Etruria with offices, housing and leisure facilities. Burslem takes its name from
the Old English man Burgheard and the British Celtic
lyme
or
lyne
, elm tree district. Cobridge
was Bennet's Bleakridge, at the heart of
Clayhanger
. Shelton Bar steelworks (his Cauldon
Bar Ironworks) were on both sides of the canal but closed in 1978, leaving the largest derelict
site in the Midlands. The rolling mills had a roof over the canal, closed in 1995, and the last
load was taken by
Shad
to the National Waterways Museum, Ellesmere Port. Etruria, named
after what were thought to be Etruscan designs, was the site of the old Wedgwood works and
it was used for the 1986 National Garden Festival. The Festival Park has the UK's top wa-
ter theme park, Waterworld, with pool, flumes, wave pool, rapids area, aqua assault course,
cinema, bowling, ski slope and Quasar.
