The main waterways are the Albert Canal connecting Antwerp to Liège, the Ghent – Terneuzen Canal through the port of Ghent connecting Ghent with the Westerschelde, the Boudewijn Canal through the port of Bruges-Zeebrugge connecting Bruges with the North Sea, the Brussels-Charleroi Canal, Brussels-Scheldt Maritime Canal and Scheldt connecting Charleroi to Antwerp, the Nimy-Blaton-Péronnes Canal and Scheldt connecting the Borinage to Antwerp, the connection between the North Sea and Antwerp and the connection between Dunkerque and Liège via the Nimy-Blaton-Péronnes Canal, the Canal du Centre, the lower Sambre and the Meuse.

Image: Péniches sur le Canal du Midi. jpg | French barges near Toulouse, France

However, the Canal du Midi was built using concrete in 1670, and there are concrete structures in Finland that date from the 16th century.

Examples include canals that connect valleys over a higher body of land, like Canal du Midi and Canal de Briare.

The first to use pound locks was the Briare Canal connecting the Loire and Seine ( 1642 ), followed by the more ambitious Canal du Midi ( 1683 ) connecting the Atlantic to the Mediterranean.

* Canal du Midi

The Suez Canal, having been built by the French government, belonged to the French Republic and was operated by the Compagnie universelle du canal maritime de Suez.

Lifts on the old Canal du Centre | Lifts on Canal du Centre ( 1888-1917 ) near La Louvière, Wallonia

fr: Canal du Mozambique

From 1880 to 1889, the French Compagnie Universelle du Canal Interocéanique under the direction of Ferdinand de Lesseps, who had successfully built the Suez Canal, attempted to construct a sea-level canal in the same general area as the present Panama Canal.

In 1846, Prosper Enfantin's Société d ' Études du Canal de Suez invited a number of experts, among them Robert Stephenson, Negrelli and Paul-Adrien Bourdaloue to study the feasibility of the Suez Canal ( with the assistance of Linant de Bellefonds ).

Moreover, the city of Toulouse has two historic sites added to the UNESCO World Heritage Site, the Canal Du Midi ( shared with other cities ), since 1996, and the Basilica of St. Sernin under the description: World Heritage Sites of the Routes of Santiago de Compostela in France, since 1998.

The city is traversed by the Canal de Brienne, the Canal du Midi and the rivers Garonne, Touch and Hers-Mort.

Other crops include wheat ( the traditional crop which made the fortune of the landlords and parliamentarians based in Toulouse, and for whose trade the famous Canal du Midi was built ), maize ( the new and nowadays most popular crop in the region ), olives ( only on the Mediterranean coast of Languedoc ), fruit, and rice ( in some coastal areas ).

Tourism on the Canal du Midi combines history ( for example viewing the nine locks of Fonseranes near Béziers ) with activities such as boating on the Canal, and walking or cycling on the towpaths.

* The Canal du Midi at Béziers Official Béziers Website ( in English )

Another bridge, Pont Marengo, crosses the Canal du Midi and provides access to the railway station.

A major part of its income, however, comes from the tourism connected to the fortifications ( Cité ) and from boat cruising on the Canal du Midi.

Narbonne is linked to the nearby Canal du Midi and the Aude River by the Canal de la Robine, which runs through the centre of town.

This major undertaking resulted in the construction of the Canal de la Robine, which was finally linked with the Canal du Midi ( then known as the Royal Canal ) via the Canal de Jonction in 1776.

Pierre Paul Riquet ( 1604 – 1680 ) planned and constructed the Canal du Midi under Colbert's patronage.

Notable canals were the Stecknitz Canal in Germany in 1398, the Briare Canal connecting the Loire and Seine in Francein 1642, followed by the Canal du Midi in 1683 connecting the Atlantic to the Mediterranean.

The total operation was a construction project comparable in magnitude with the Panama Canal, but in 1917 time was in short supply ; ;

There, in one of the major Swiss engineering feats of the 19th century, the Jura water correction, the river, which had previously rendered the countryside north of Bern a swampland through frequent flooding, was diverted by the Hagneck Canal into Lake of Bienne.

West of Broadway as far as Canal Street was the city's fashionable residential area until circa 1825 ; landfill has more than tripled the area and the Hudson shore now lies far to the west, beyond TriBeCa and Battery Park City.

Another change was made on November 10, 1963, when Broadway became one-way southbound from Herald Square to Madison Square ( 23rd Street ) and Union Square ( 14th Street ) to Canal Street, and two routes — Sixth Avenue south of Herald Square and Centre Street, Lafayette Street, and Fourth Avenue south of Union Square — became one-way northbound.

This was compounded by transportation problems-the coffee-growing areas were mainly on the Central Valley and only had access to the port in Puntarenas on the Pacific Coast, and before the Panama Canal was opened, ships from Europe had to sail around Cape Horn in order to get to the Pacific Coast.

By far the longest canal was the Grand Canal of China, still the longest canal in the world today, and the oldest extant one.

Canal building was revived in this age because of commercial expansion from the 12th century.

To break out of the limitations caused by river valleys, the first summit level canals were developed with the Grand Canal of China in 581 – 617 AD whilst in Europe the first, also using single locks, was the Stecknitz Canal in Germany in 1398.

As well as industrial uses, the Royal Military Canal on the Romney Marsh was built so as create a barrier against invading troops, and hiding places for British troops during the Napoleonic Wars.

The Erie Canal ( opened 1825 ) was chartered and owned by the state of New York and financed by bonds bought by private investors.

Assured of a market for their farm products the settlement of the U. S. mid-west was greatly accelerated by the Erie Canal.

The Erie Canal ( as well as other canals ) was instrumental in lowering the differences in commodity prices between these various markets across America.

The Rideau Canal was built as a result of the War of 1812 to provide military transportation between the British colonies of Upper Canada and Lower Canada as an alternative to part of the St. Lawrence River, which was susceptible to blockade by the United States.

Many notable sea canals were completed in this period, starting with the Suez Canal ( 1869 )-which carries tonnage many times that of most other canals-and the Kiel Canal ( 1897 ), though the Panama Canal was not opened until 1914.

Cape Breton Island is joined to the mainland by the Canso Causeway, which was completed in 1955, enabling direct road and rail traffic to and from the island, but requiring marine traffic to pass through the Canso Canal at the eastern end of the causeway.

Domestically, the Grand Canal was expanded and proved to be a stimulus to domestic trade.

In post-Roman Britain, the first canal built appears to have been the Exeter Canal, which opened in 1563.

The opening of the Sankey Canal in 1757, followed by the Bridgewater Canal in 1761, which halved the price of coal in Liverpool and Manchester England, respectively, triggered a period of " canal mania " in Britain so that between 1760 and 1820 over one hundred canals were built.

Ohio built many miles of canal, Indiana had working canals for a few decades, and the Illinois and Michigan Canal connected the Great Lakes to the Mississippi River system until replaced by a channelized river waterway.

The first Welland Canal, which opened in 1829 between Lake Ontario and Lake Erie, bypassing Niagara Falls and the Lachine Canal ( 1825 ), which allowed ships to skirt the nearly impassable rapids on the St. Lawrence River at Montreal were built for commerce.

In some cases railways have been built along the canal route, an example being the Croydon Canal.

Geophysically the city is likewise surrounded by the narrow coastal plain of Vocha, Corinthian Gulf, Corinth Canal, the Isthmus of Corinth, Saronic Gulf, Oneia Mountains, and the monolithic rock of Acrocorinth, where the medieval acropolis was built.

This canal was built in the mid-eighteenth century as part of the northern Munich canal system to which the Nymphenburger Canal belongs as well.

A prominent case can be seen in the Love Canal Homeowner ’ s association ( LCHA ); in this case a housing development was built on a site that had been used for toxic dumping by the Hooker Chemical Company.

Ukrainian built Voskhod ( hydrofoil ) | Voskhod on the noordzeekanaal | North Sea Canal, the Netherlands

The Bridgewater Canal, the first successful canal, crossing the Manchester Ship Canal, one of the last canals to be built.

New canals were hastily built in the aim of replicating the commercial success of the Bridgewater Canal, the most notable being the Leeds and Liverpool Canal and the Thames and Severn Canal which opened in 1774 and 1789 respectively.

The last major canal to be built in the United Kingdom was the Manchester Ship Canal, which upon opening in 1894 was the largest ship canal in the world, and opened Manchester as a port.

Plans were made to take advantage of this route to build an interoceanic canal, the Nicaragua Canal, but the Panama Canal was built instead.

To the east, the Canal des Pangalanes is a chain of man-made and natural lakes connected by canals built by the French just inland from the east coast and running parallel to it for some.