Pantyffynon (near Godre'r-graig) Maintenance Yard Buildings Swansea Canal Dry Dock 13, Canal Houses 3 & 4

The yard and the buildings were on the north-west uphill bank of the Swansea Canal adjacent to the present valley road which now occupies the line of the canal. There was an open yard with canal-side smithy for repairing metal components of locks and boats in the adjacent dry dock (DD13). Two cottages remained in the north corner of the yard until demolition in the mid 1970s. That to the north was the older having stone segmental arched openings in a fabric of coursed local Pennant sandstone rubble. The doorhead was supported by an iron lintel with the rear of these openings in the front facade having one continuous wooden lintel. The north wall had a blocked opening 2.3m wide, indicating that originally it had probably been a canal workshop. The short roof did not need intermediate supporting trusses. By 18751 a rear extension had been built with brick detail and a Victorian bay window. The original building was converted into a dwelling, the workshop door narrowed, the rear window made into a door and tall dormer windows inserted in the facade. The closure of this workshop area and its conversion probably resulted from the construction of a new smithy over the former dry dock.

A second separate block was added to the south of this building before 1832.2 Its facade, with extensive fenestration, suggests that it was built as canal offices. The lintels were of wood and the upper chimney-stacks of dark red thin bricks, probably early 19th century. The roof included two trusses with tenoned purlins. Later it certainly became a dwelling, after 1875 a rear stone range with brick dressings was added. This was shared by the two houses as was part of the first floor of the adjoining property above a new rear passage of the southern dwelling. A red brick block of two rooms, at the northern corner of the rear ranges, was built during the last period of construction. Both buildings were demolished in 1974 and only the high rubble wall of the maintenance yard enclosing a brass band's hut was left to mark the site.
Maintenance yard SN 7605 0766

1. Swansea Canal Map of 1875-76.
2. Swansea Canal Map of 1796-99.

Stephen R. Hughes, 17.08.2007