Dudley No. 2 Canal

 

This canal was commissioned in 1793 to link the Dudley No.1 Canal at Park Head with the Worcester and Birmingham Canal at Selly Oak. The Coombeswood Tube Works was established in 1860 by Abraham Barnsley. In its time it was the largest tube works in England and used the canal to ferry tubes to the rail branch adjacent to Hawne basin.

 

This practice continued up until 1967. The original brick bridge which crossed the canal at the end of the
Green Lane was-demolished during the Second World War as an anti-invasion measure! The current steel bridge was constructed on the same site in 1993 by the Halesowen Abbey Trust.

 

At Parkhead Junction the Dudley No.2 Canal leaves in a south easterly direction. The original line of the canal (superseded by Brewins Tunnel) used to run through land now used by the reservoir.

 

Hawne Basin (also called Halesowen or Coombeswood Basin), opened in 1797 as a public wharf serving Halesowen. In 1902 the wharf became a rail interchange.The basin marks the end of the navigable length of the canal, following the collapse of the Lapal Tunnel in 1917. Since 1980 the basin has been run by the
Coombeswood Canal Trust as a marina.