Foxton Locks
Selected Wild Place / Other Wild Places / Public Rights of Way / VC55 boundary
The main car park is on Gumley Road, just south of Foxton village.
A number of bus routes will take you to the site. For more details click here.
- Canal
- Grand Union Canal Conservation Area
Total species seen at this site:
Foxton Locks is located on the Leicester line of the Grand Union Canal about 5 km west of Market Harborough and named after the nearby village of Foxton. There are ten canal locks consisting of two "staircases" each of five locks. Alongside the locks is the Foxton Inclined Plane, built in 1900 to resolve the operational restrictions imposed by the lock flight. It was not a commercial success and only remained in full-time operation for ten years. It was dismantled in 1926 but a project to re-create it commenced in the 2000s.
As well as the canal itself, the site includes several balancing ponds used to capture water and refill the locks after use. The site comprises grassland and shrubby areas.
The canal and its margins support a number of interesting aquatic plants, including Large Bitter-cress, Water Mint, Water-cress and Broad-leaved Pondweed. The hedges and shrubs also support a number of leaf-mining insects.
Banner image: By Burn the asylum - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1219161
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