11839

 

II  

Designated  

29/01/1980  

25/02/2000  

Aberdulais Basin at the head of the Tennant Canal  

 

Neath Port Talbot  

Tonna  

 

Aberdulais  

277380  

199370  

 

Approximately 0.4km N of Tonna village on the E side of the River Neath and W of the Neath Canal.  

Transport  

 

The Tennant Canal, engineered by William Kirkhouse, was begun in 1821 and opened in 1824 from the Neath Canal at Aberdulais to Port Tennant, Swansea. The interchange basin is at the head of the Tennant Canal and linked the Neath and Tennant Canals. A dry dock was also built on its SE side. Traffic on the Tennant Canal declined from the 1860s due to competition with railways but the canal did not close to commercial traffic until 1934.  

An irregular shaped, stone-lined basin approximately 100m x 20m, part filled with reeds and rushes at the time of inspection (October 1999). At the NE end it joins the Neath Canal (beneath Pont Gam), while the SW end, now infilled, joined the Aberdulais Aqueduct. A concrete slipway on the SE side originally connected with a dry dock (now infilled).  

 

Listed for its industrial archaeological interest as an early C19 canal structure, and for group value with other associated listed items on the Tennant Canal at Aberdulais.