Authorised for construction on the 9th of June, 1790 the Glamorganshire Canal was envisaged by the ironmasters of Merthyr Tydfil as a means of transporting their products to the docks in Cardiff. For chief engineer Thomas Dadford senior it proved to be a difficult task not least because 50 locks had to be constructed.
16 of the 50 locks were located in a mile long stretch between Abercynon and Quakers Yard, where there was a fall of around 200 feet. When completed it would take a boat over two hours to navigate this section of the canal. While the first part of the canal, between Cardiff and Navigation House (Abercynon), opened for traffic on the 10th of February 1794 it would take another 4 years to cover the 9 miles between Abercynon and Merthyr.
The principal shareholder in the Glamorganshire Canal was ironmaster Richard Crawshay of Cyfarthfa and, to the frustration of the areas other ironmasters, he expected his products to take precedence at the canal head loading areas. This, coupled with the problem of congestion which the upper, heavily locked section of the canal suffered from, led to the owners of the Dowlais, Penydarren and Plymouth ironworks constructing the Merthyr Tramroad (sometimes known as the Penydarren Tramroad). Opened in 1802 it ran 9.5 miles from Merthyr Tydfil to the canal basin in Abercynon.
It was around this canal basin that the original community of Abercynon grew. As well as the canal company headquarters, located at Navigation House, there were warehouses, depot houses, a winding hole, saw pit, blacksmiths shop and possibly a dry dock. Soon cottages and other buildings were constructed. The growth in population led to a Post Office/ General Store opening and, eventually, a surgery. The Basin was also home to three public houses- the Lifeboat and Swan (since converted into Swan Cottages) were joined later by New Inn.
On the 21st of February 1804 the Merthyr Tramroad was the setting for the world’s first steam engine journey as Richard Trevithick’s “High Pressure Tram-Engine” took a load of 10 tons of iron from the Penydarren Iron Works to Navigation House in Abercynon. After this famous first run it made several other journeys and on one occasion hauled a load of 25 tons. Unfortunately the engine was prone to breaking down and its weight, around 5 tons, meant that it damaged many of the cast iron plate rails. This led to the experiment eventually being abandoned.
The Basin was also the terminus for a second tramroad. The Llanfabon Tramroad, sometimes referred to as Sir William Smith’s Tramroad, was constructed in 1810 to bring coal from the Nelson area to the Glamorganshire Canal. The route can still be traced from the Basin to Fiddlers Elbow whereupon it becomes the road to Nelson.
The Aberdare Canal Company obtained an Act of Parliament on the 28th of March 1794 which authorised the building of a canal from Aberdare to join the Glamorganshire Canal in Abercynon. It also allowed for the building of tramroads to mines, quarries or works within 8 miles of the proposed route. As construction of a canal was not deemed viable at the time- only the Hirwaun Ironworks would have made use of it, the company instead engaged James Dadford, son of Thomas Dadford senior, to survey the route of a tramroad from Aberdare to Penderyn. The route of the canal was re-surveyed in 1800 by Thomas Dadford, brother of James Dadford, but no further action was taken.
It was not until after the opening of two further ironworks in the area in 1806 that a canal was deemed viable. In 1809 Edward Martin was employed to re-survey the route and Thomas Sheasby contracted to construct the canal. 6 and three quarter miles in length the Aberdare Canal finally opened for traffic in 1812.
For over 40 years the Glamorganshire Canal was the most successful in south Wales however the opening of the Taff Vale Railway in 1841 marked the beginning of the end. While the canal managed to hold its own for a time the closure of the ironworks in the 1870s was a serious blow. Despite improvements made by the Marquess of Bute, who had taken over control of the Glamorganshire Canal in 1885, by 1886 six railway companies all competing for traffic were serving Merthyr Tydfil.
As the canal struggled to compete for traffic it was struck by another problem- severe subsidence at the upper sections, especially around Aberfan, forced the closure of the Merthyr to Abercynon section on the 6th of December 1898. Two years later, in 1900, the Aberdare Canal also closed to commercial traffic. In 1915 further breaches in the canal and subsidence at Cilfynydd saw its closure between Abercynon and Pontypridd. The Pontypridd to Cardiff section remained in operation until 1942, the canal eventually closed in 1951.
Today much of the route of the Glamorganshire Canal is filled in and covered, mainly by the A470, while the Aberdare Canal was largely destroyed by the building of New Road.
The Abercynon history blog 