c. 96), and the 93 mi route from Derwent Mouth to Preston Brook was completed in eleven years, opening in 1777.

The Coventry canal was authorised two years after the Trent and Mersey, in 1768, and should have run from Coventry, via Bedworth and Atherstone, to join the Grand Trunk Canal at Fradley. The first 10 mi to Bedworth were completed in 1769, and a lucrative trade in coal soon developed between the Bedworth collieries and Coventry. The canal was completed to Atherstone in 1771, but the next stage involved a flight of eleven locks,