SHEFFIELD & TINSLEY CANAL Pt 3 - Tinsley South to Rotherham Lock. (August 2025)

CHAPTERS
(0:00-10:55) Tinsley South - Tinsley Lock No12
(10:56-24:01) Halfpenny Bridge - Holmes Lock
(24:02-36:31) Holmes Bridge & Ickles Moorings to Rotherham Lock

Welcome to the third and final set of the towpath trek from Sheffield to Rotherham, which started four miles and two videos back at Victoria Quays.
Starting three days after the last video and setting foot three miles further, we see our way through the three remaining Tinsley locks and also the first of three times where the canal and the River Don historically combined.
If you bob back to the first bit you should recall how the initial 1751-built bargeway was combined into the River Don Navigation on an agreement with the Duke of Norfolk to only travel southward as far as Tinsley, with the goods being transferred to road to reach Sheffield until the full canal corridor to the city finally opened in 1819.
Having passed an unfriendly row of bright red orange plastic floats would pick up only canal again and the earlier set of locks from the originally permitted waterway which carry names rather than numbers as a nice way of being set apart.
Jordans and Holmes Lock while sitting separated by half a mile of almost entirely straight canal have their own distinguishing characteristics such as the dried up original route in the case of the former and redundant rail track across the top of a bridge in the case of the latter.
Discussing railways (sorry ... again) about half a dozen lines lost and still active lace the top of the route into Rotherham from former colliery lines to lumpen steel girder structures. The small marina and moorings as we slew round a curve towards the town centre seems to have imprisoned Ickles lock within its private grounds so I'm unfortunately restricted to viewing it from the adjacent bridge.

There is however a spectacular ramp reaching beneath the tramway opposite decorated following a development of the local flood defences and a little way after we pass the New York Stadium we see the biggest fruit of that program with the imposing horseshoe shaped barrier.
Everything around Rotherham lock appears changed beyond recognition in the recent two years actually on the opposite side to the station with new Riverside area leisure park and cinema now sitting on the site of the former Tesco store retaining sensitive odes in detail to the industrial heritage of South Yorkshire that once owned this area.
If you spot someone waving in the distance as I sign off at the end that's my mate Lucy who I'd already bumped into unexpectedly whilst filming near the flood barrier.


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