Linlithgow Canal Centre

Linlithgow Union Canal Society was founded in 1975 to promote the use of canals and encourage their restoration. In 1977 the Society opened the only canal museum in Scotland, in a former canal stable at the Manse Road Basin on the Edinburgh & Glasgow Union Canal in Linlithgo. The canal, whose engineer was  Hugh Baird (1770-1827), extended 50 km from Edinburgh to a junction with the Forth & Clyde Canal at Falkirk, and opened in 1822. Initially passenger boats linking Edinburgh with Glasgow plied along the canal but railway competition brought an end to the service by 1848. West of Linlithgow is one of the canal’s principal engineering features, the twelve-arch, 247 m long aqueduct above the River Avon. A foundry was among the enterprises that became established around the basin. Commercial traffic on the Union Canal ended in 1936 and it was closed to through navigation in 1965. It has subsequently been restored, and is now linked with the Forth & Clyde Canal by the Falkirk Wheel. The Canal Centre has displays relating to waterways history, and is the focus for trips by boat, regularly to the Avon Aqueduct and occasionally as far as the Falkirk Wheel.