Another culverting expedition from last Christmas when I was staying near Burnley.
Haslingden is a typical East Lancs mill town spinning first wool then cotton.
Many of the mill buildings are still there, some even in use for textiles, and Swinnel Brook snakes around and sometimes under them, running either side what is now a road (used to be a railway).
The mills are shown in red on the map on the right - the blue areas are reservoirs, which have now been built over or are car parks.
The brook played an important part, powering the earliest factories and was also needed for textile processing and filling boilers when steam engines arrived.
There are only a few culverts, red on the map on the left, of total length about 0.9 km.
The southernmost two have been reported before in 2009: https://www.28dayslater.co.uk/threa...ingden-rossendale-lancashire-june-2009.41273/.
Starting at the bottom by Holme Spring Mill, which houses a number of active businesses…
…we emerge into a short open bit beside Grane Road Mill.
The next section goes under the bypass in a variety of styles.
After two short culverts which cross and recross under the bypass the brook goes under a currently empty mill (formerly Vine Grove Mill) then dives under the site of another mill (Commercial Mill) before emerging into a concrete box next to the bypass again.
Low bit coming up…
…now straighten out again.
From here it’s an open channel past another mill which looks a bit derelict (Britannia Mill, listed) and the remains of some old sluices before the brook enters another culvert which was too low to bother with.
So not a huge amount to see in this one, but the Haslingden area does have a couple of excellent museums.
Grane Mill is well worth a look when it’s open (different place from the Grane Road mill mentioned above) and so is the Textile Museum down the road in Helmshore. This has a water turbine parked outside - nothing to do with the mill, but here’s a gratuitous turbine pic.
Haslingden is a typical East Lancs mill town spinning first wool then cotton.
Many of the mill buildings are still there, some even in use for textiles, and Swinnel Brook snakes around and sometimes under them, running either side what is now a road (used to be a railway).
The mills are shown in red on the map on the right - the blue areas are reservoirs, which have now been built over or are car parks.
The brook played an important part, powering the earliest factories and was also needed for textile processing and filling boilers when steam engines arrived.
There are only a few culverts, red on the map on the left, of total length about 0.9 km.
The southernmost two have been reported before in 2009: https://www.28dayslater.co.uk/threa...ingden-rossendale-lancashire-june-2009.41273/.
Starting at the bottom by Holme Spring Mill, which houses a number of active businesses…
…we emerge into a short open bit beside Grane Road Mill.
The next section goes under the bypass in a variety of styles.
After two short culverts which cross and recross under the bypass the brook goes under a currently empty mill (formerly Vine Grove Mill) then dives under the site of another mill (Commercial Mill) before emerging into a concrete box next to the bypass again.
Low bit coming up…
…now straighten out again.
From here it’s an open channel past another mill which looks a bit derelict (Britannia Mill, listed) and the remains of some old sluices before the brook enters another culvert which was too low to bother with.
So not a huge amount to see in this one, but the Haslingden area does have a couple of excellent museums.
Grane Mill is well worth a look when it’s open (different place from the Grane Road mill mentioned above) and so is the Textile Museum down the road in Helmshore. This has a water turbine parked outside - nothing to do with the mill, but here’s a gratuitous turbine pic.
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