This week marks the 85th anniversary of the first ship sailing through the Albert Canal. Stretching for 129 kilometres this waterway connects the great Walloon city of Liège with the port of Antwerp, motor of the Flemish economy. The canal also links the towns of Genk and Hasselt (Limburg) and Herentals and Geel (Antwerp Province) to the metropolis of Antwerp. It took 12,000 labourers 9 years to dig and build the canal. The Albert Canal has only grown in importance over the years, as more and more industry developed along its banks. And with the recent heightening of its bridges, more containers can now also be transported on every ship.
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The Albert Canal at 85: taking 5,000 lorries off the roads every day!
Colin Clapson
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Construction on the Albert Canal began in 1930. It was on 31 May of that year that King Albert I did the honours at a ground-breaking ceremony. The construction involved a lot of manual labour back then requiring the deployment of 12,000 labourers in all. Nine years later, on 30 July 1939, the first ship sailed through the Albert Canal that takes its name from our ill-fated monarch, whose death in 1934 is officially attributed to a climbing accident in the Ardennes.
Economic importance
The Albert Canal is of great economic importance today. That economic importance was not there right from the start. Soon after the canal was taken into service, the Second World War erupted and Nazi Germany invaded Belgium. To arrest the German invasion, many bridges over the canal were immediately blown up. However, two bridges remained intact, allowing the German army to advance quickly.
After the war, the Albert Canal could once again fulfil its economic role. Initial assumption expected annual traffic of 15 million tonnes. That volume was reached in 1955 as a result of the post-war economic boom. In 1969, a record of 40 million tonnes was reached.
The canal has been modernised a few times over the years. It was widened in the late 1960s, taking its breath to 100 metres and allowing larger ships to navigate the canal. A second modernisation took place during the past 20 years and that included a heightening of all the bridges on the canal. As a result, containers stacked four layers high on the deck of a vessel can now be transported.
The canal has also attracted a lot of industry to its banks. For instance, there are large industrial estates along the banks in the towns of Genk, Beringen, Tessenderlo, Geel and Herentals. A lot of the companies based there use the canal to transport goods.
‘Currently, about 36 million tonnes of goods are transported on the canal each year,’ says Chris Danckaerts, director of the Flemish Waterway Company that manages the canal. ‘If all these goods were transported by trucks via the E313, we would be at a standstill from morning to evening.’
It’s believed transports via the Albert Canal take 5,000 lorries a day off the motorway.
Supplier of drinking water too!
The Albert Canal is also a major source of drinking water. ‘About 40 per cent of Flemish families drink water that comes from the Albert Canal, though it is thoroughly processed first,’ Chris Danckaerts explains.