How did the development of canals and railways influence the Industrial revolution?The growth of the Industrial Revolution depended on the ability to transport raw materials and finished goods over long distances. There were three main types of transportation that increased during the Industrial Revolution: waterways, roads, and railroads. In the early years people used to travel and transport goods by ship, horses, oxen and even humans were used to carry merchandises.
“The first wheels on cart were built in 3500 BC along with the first river boat, and by 2000 BC horses were domesticated for the use of transportation.”Between the years 1700 to 2000 many advances were made in the transportation sector of the world. For example, Canals were built for the ease of transferring heavy goods; Railways, Roads, Cars, Air Planes and even Space shuttle were built. Consequently, the need for faster and effective transportation grew more and more, and the transportation system evolved simultaneously. Roads were initially the main source of traveling goods, and well-maintained roads were one of the major achievements of 18th century England.The Turnpike Trusts played a huge role in this triumph.
The turnpike roads were mainly used by the local entrepreneurs and who ever used that stretch of road had to pay tolls to bodies of local trustees. The tolls were used by the turnpike trusts to maintain the roads and as the quality of the roads became better traveling became faster and safer. “Although heavy goods were still carried more efficiently by water, road transport became the best means of carrying goods and people rapidly and safely between the booming towns of late 18th and early 19th century England.”At the time of the Industrial Revolution there were many breakthroughs in transportation and in the early stages the building of canals and there use placed a huge support on the industrials. “Canals were needed for the Industrial Revolution which was creating huge amounts of heavy produce which had to be moved. Roads simply could not handle such weights and the vehicles needed to move this produce did not exist.
” Canals were the answer to moving heavy objects large distances.With the help of this new invention the industrialist could now transport heavy weighted goods easily through the canals water ways and even travel over the bridge. Throughout the period considered here, carriage by boat or barge was normally the lowest cost method of carrying bulk goods and so was the preferred method for heavy commodities. The man most associated with early canals was the Duke of Bridgewater.
He owned coal mines in Lancashire but he needed to get the coal to the big market of Manchester which was nearly six miles away.Thus, he decided to build a canal. The canal had a series of tunnels which were linked directly to the coal mines. “The canal was a huge success as it made the duke a lot of money the price of coal fell in Manchester by 50% therefore making it cheaper and the cheaper it was the more was sold. People could not get enough of the duke's coal.” Seeing the success of the Bridgewater Canal, other people decided to opening up series of canals that linked the major industrial centers of Britain.
The canals had some major problems; traveling was becoming slower due to the construction of better roads, foods that got rotten quickly could not be transported by the canals, in the winter the canals would freeze up and in summer they would become dry which became a huge problem in transportation. Due to this trains were soon to taken over the role played by the canals. During the industrial revolution, steam engines became the dominant source of power and remained so into the early decades of the 20th century.In the year 1801, Richard Trevithick built the first-ever steam locomotive to run along a track. “It pulled five cars loaded with ten tons of iron and 70 ironworkers about nine miles.
Unfortunately, it was so heavy that it broke its rails and was retired after just three trips.” After that, George Stephenson built the world's first public railways: the Stockton and Darlington railway in 1825 and the Liverpool-Manchester railway in 1830. Stephenson was the chief engineer for several of the railways.In 1829, George Stephenson and his son Robert invented a multi-tubular boiler for the now-famous locomotive "Rocket". The competition for faster and effective transportation grew in the time of the industrial revolution, and for that reason new innovative was born.
These new transportation systems also helped the industrialist to grow faster than ever. Without these transportations it would have been hard for the rapid growth of industries and vice versa without the industrialists there were no need for such transports at that time.
