Cae'r Lan Dock and Dry Dock, Brecon Forest and Little London Railways (2,713m north-east of Ystradgynlais, 25,436m from Swansea) D36, DD15, T54, T53

The dry dock and dock lay southeast of the canal immediately below Lock 35 and was the interchange point with the canal's longest and most ambitious goods feeder - the Brecon Forest Tramroad which was designed to help in the development of the Great Forest of Brecon - the Fforest Fawr - after its enclosure in the 1820s and extended the trading influence of the Swansea Canal as far north as Sennybridge . The detailed history and archaeology of that arterial railway has already been published.1

The dock itself consisted of a square area next to a short cut running under a towing-path bridge and with a small building on its south side. Beyond it lay a dry-dock on the north-west bank of the River Tawe.

John Christie, the builder of the Brecon Forest Tramroad and the owner of `Grain Clawdd Colliery' applied for permission to build this dock or branch canal parallel with the railway in July 1824.2

The present valley road covers the dry dock and a side road covers part of the original main dock basin, the remainder being heavily overgrown. Part of the dock stone walling and foundations of a building remain.

The dock was later used (by 1875) for a 1,330m line that bridged the River Tawe and zig-zagged up the steep eastern hillside to a series of mining tunnels producing large quantities of iron-ore to be used in smelting further down the valley. With the decline of the ironworks the mines and railway were disused by 1896-97.3

1. Hughes. Brecon Forest Tramroads.

2. Canal Minutes, July 1824.

3. Canal Map 1875, O.S. 1:2,500 2nd. Ed. 1896-97.

Dock SN 8039 1213
Dry Dock SN 8041 1210