A HUGE specialist crane lifted giant tailor-made oak gates into place at Bingley Three Rise Locks yesterday watched by fascinated crowds.

The replacement gates are part of a £150,000 restoration project at the famous site on the Leeds and Liverpool Canal which in October celebrates the bi-centennial of its opening.

The works involved the largest "spider crane" ever used for works on the waterways, which had to be modified so it could straddle the canal and lift out the old gates and lower in the new ones, which had been specially made at the Canal & River Trust's workshop at Stanley Ferry in Wakefield.

Each individual lock gate made from British oak is unique to its location and had to be hand crafted by a skilled team of carpenters to achieve a water-tight fit in its chamber where it will operate for some 30 years.

Construction manager Martin Pollard oversaw the monumental works and explained the mechanics of the job.

He said: "No vehicles can get onto this site to do any work or deliver a crane so first we had to put a 20 tonne pontoon into the canal above the locks and put the crane onto it.

"Then that was floated down to the Three Rise, and it only just fitted into the lock.

"The crane is the biggest of its type we've ever used and was specially extended and modified.

"One of the main questions people have been asking is how on earth did we get it there?"

Mr Pollard said no great finds had emerged from draining the locks during the works, which began in November.

"Years back they used to find all sorts - even unexploded bombs. But we did find mobile phones that have fallen out of people's pockets."

Lock keeper and Trust fundraiser Paul Ford was on hand to give expert information to onlookers who crowded onto a viewing bridge.

"We've had hundreds of people coming to see the work taking place."

The brilliant thing about Bingley Three Rise is that it's a true staircase and the top gate of one lock is the bottom gate of the next one.

"The bottom lock is also the deepest section of the entire Leeds and Liverpool Canal."

Mr Ford said that as part of the 200th anniversary celebration the Kennet barge, which is owned by the Leeds and Liverpool Canal Society would be squeezing its way through Bingley.

"It's the biggest boat on the canal and the same size as the old working barges at 62ft by 14ft 6ins and only just fits through the gates - which is all it had to do," he said.

The Leeds and Liverpool Canal has a total of 91 locks and extends for a total of 127 ¼ miles across the Pennines and was constructed over a period of 46 years (1770-1816) with various sections becoming operational at different times during the construction period.

Together with the Aire & Calder Navigation, which it meets at Leeds, it offers a coast to coast route between the Irish Sea and the North Sea.

Richard Parry, chief executive of the Canal & River Trust, said: "The Trust cares for a remarkable network of historic waterways which are still working just as they were designed to 200 years ago.

"Keeping them open and safe requires a huge amount of planning and investment and involves a wide range of experts, from civil engineers and hydrologists to heritage experts and ecologists.2

The works at Bingley are part of the Canal & River Trust’s £45 million national restoration programme to repair the country’s waterways.