Paper short abstract:

What happens when a form of infrastructure becomes defunct? In Britain, early industrial-era canal development was superseded by rail. Using the concept of 'edgelands', this paper explores canals as spaces of both decay and (re)creation.

Paper long abstract:

What happens when a form of infrastructure becomes defunct? Britain's early industrial-era canals were engineering feats. But, they were soon eclipsed by the bigger, faster feats of rail development. While railways became an industrial archetype, integral to the modern experience of space-time compression, canals, by contrast, became spaces of 'folkification'. Into the twentieth century, the increasing marginality of canals often led to disuse and closure. More recently, canals have been regenerated, becoming spaces of leisure and pleasure. In this paper, I offer a case study of the Rochdale Canal, Northern England, which opened in 1804, closed in 1952, and reopened in 2002. Using the concept of 'Edgelands', I explore how, as defunct infrastructure, canals have served as spaces for both decay and (re)creation.