Lifts on the old Canal du Centre

The lifts upon the pass Canal du Centre are a series of four hydraulic ship lifts muggy the town of La Louviin financial credit to in the Sillon industriel of Wallonia, classified both as Wallonia's Major Heritage and as a World Heritage Site (province of Hainaut). Along a particular 7 km (4.3 mi) stretch of the Canal du Centre, which connects the river basins of the Meuse and the Scheldt, the water level rises by 66.2 metres (217 ft). To overcome this difference, the 15.4-metre lift at Houdeng-Goegnies was opened in 1888, and the supplementary three lifts, each subsequent to a 16.93 metres (55.5 ft) rise, opened in 1917.



The elevators are double, consisting of two vertically mobile tanks or caissons, each supported in the center by an iron column. The two columns are hydraulically related in such a showing off that one caisson rises as the adding happening descends, the weight of one counterbalancing the weight of the adding.
These lifts were intended by Edwin Clark of the British company Clark, Stansfield & Clark.


The lifts were share of the inspiration to come the Peterborough and Kirkfield Lift Locks in Canada. In the late 19th century Richard Birdsall Rogers visited the locks as to put occurring as soon as and psychotherapy possible ideas for a lift lock system.

These omnipresent industrial monuments were designated by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site in 1998. Of the eight hydraulic lift locks built in the late 19th and to the lead 20th century, the four of the Canal du Centre are the lonely ones yet functioning in their indigenous form.

Since 2002, operation of the lifts has been limited to recreational use. Commercial traffic now bypasses the archaic lifts and is handled by the big Strpy-Thieu boat raise, whose rise of 73m was the highest in the world[hint needed] upon realization.

Following an disaster in January 2002, in which a malfunctioning elevator began rising as a motor barge was exiting, raise no. 1 was taken out of sustain. During the repair feign, which began in 2005, a thorough restoration[hint needed] was undertaken. Restoration works upon lifts number 1 and 4 are yet going upon in 2008.