Bingley Five Rise

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The 5-rise is the steepest staircase flight of locks in the UK, with a gradient of about 1:5 (a rise of 59ft 2in over a distance of 320ft). The intermediate and bottom gates are the tallest in the country.

Because of the complications of working a staircase lock, and because so many boaters are inexperienced, a full-time lock keeper is employed, and the locks are padlocked "out of hours".

Barry, the "locky", after twenty years based here is now almost infamous on the local canals. Barry was awarded an MBE in the 2006 New Year Honours List for "Services to Inland Waterways in the North"

The locks opened on March 21, 1774 and a crowd of 30,000 people turned out to celebrate it!

The smaller Three Rise opened at the same time just a few hundred yards further down the canal.

The staircase is a major tourist attraction in the area. Most boats that pass through attract a lot of attention especially at weekends where they may be a crowd of thirty people or more watching a boat go up or down!

The staircase underwent extensive restorative maintenance in 2004,and again in 2006 when the lock gates and paddles were replaced. As is expected with such a feat of engineering it requires a lot of maintenance and is often on British Waterway's list of winter stoppages.