Venta Dubysa Canal
The Venta-Dubysa Canal ( Lithuanian Ventos – Dubysos kanalas , Polish Kanał Windawski , ( Windau Canal )) is an unfinished canal in Lithuania that connects the Dubysa near Bazilionai , Šiauliai district , with the Venta ( Windau ) near Tolučiai , district Kelmė , should connect.
From 1821 onwards, Prussia imposed prohibitively high tariffs on the transit of Polish and Lithuanian goods through its territory. This practically cut off Polish trade from access to the Prussian ports on the Baltic Sea . So far this had been carried out via the Vistula and Danzig as well as the river and the city of Memel . The Polish Minister of Economic Affairs, Franciszek Ksawery Drucki-Lubecki , came up with the idea of opening a new trade route that would connect Congress Poland with the Courland port of Ventspils ( Windau ).
The waterway was planned and built in two sections. The first section was the Augustów Canal in the Augustów Voivodeship of the Kingdom of Poland, which established a connection from the Vistula via the Narew and Biebrza rivers to the Czarna Hańcza tributary of the Memel . The second section was the Windau or Venta-Dubysa Canal, which was supposed to connect the Memel to the Venta via its tributary Dubysa in the Kaunas governorate of the Russian Empire .
The work begun in 1825 came to a standstill in 1831 as a result of the Polish November Uprising and the conclusion of trade agreements with Prussia. At the beginning of the 20th century, they were resumed by the Russian side on Lithuanian territory, but suspended again in the First World War . After the war, Lithuania gained control of the lower reaches of the Memel and the port of Klaipėda . Therefore, there was no need to continue building the Windau Canal.
The canal has a length of 15 km. It initially follows an Ice Age valley through which the Kurtuva stream flows. Twenty chamber locks were planned to overcome height differences.
Individual evidence
- ^ Szymon Askenazy: Dantzig & Poland . George Allen & Unwin LTD., London 1921, pp. 83-84.
- ^ Cohn, Gustav: The Science of Finance . University of Chicago Press, Chicago 1895, p. 397.
- ^ Von Treitschke, Heinrich: Treitschke's History of Germany in the Nineteenth Century . McBride Nast & Company, New York 1916, p. 497.
- ↑ a b c Mieczysław, Jackiewicz: Litwa: podróż sentymentalna 2006. (Polish)
- ^ Augustów Canal - Regional Water Management Authority in Warsaw (RZGW Warsawa) . Archived from the original on March 22, 2012. Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved April 27, 2011.
- ^ A b Russian Commerce in the Black Sea . In: The Bankers' magazine . January 1855, p. 500.
