The BCN is connected to the rest of the English canal system at several junctions.

Here it was reported that on 25 March 1768, the first general assembly of the Company of Proprietors of the Birmingham Canal Navigation was held at the Swann Inn, Birmingham, to raise funds to submit for an act of Parliament.

3. c. 87) authorized the extension from Broadwater to Walsall, and the short cut between Bloomfield and Deepfield, where the Coseley Tunnel was constructed, which with a length of 1.75 miles (2.82 km), avoided a detour around Tipton Hill of 4 miles (6.4 km).

Between 1825 and 1829 the canal was improved by the cutting down by 16 feet (4.9 m) of the summit at Smethwick, which occupied two and a half years, and cost £560,000 (equivalent to £62,250,000 in 2023),[5] and by cutting off bends and erecting steam engines which reduced the cost of haulage by 4d.

[6] Between 1825 and 1837 the navigation was improved between Spon Lane, Deepfield and Wolverhampton, saving a distance of six miles, which reduced the toll on coal by 9d per ton.

][3] From 1839 to 1843 the Tame Valley Canal was built, along with the Bentley, Rushall and Walsall Junction Canals opening up the Cannock Chase and Wyrley coal districts to the town of Birmingham[6] at a cost upwards of £570,000 (equivalent to £70,680,000 in 2023).

The extension to Huddlesford and the Lord Hay and Daw End branches were constructed under the Birmingham Canal Navigation Act 1794 (34 Geo.

[3] In 1855, the Cannock Extension Canal and the Wyrley Bank Branch were added to the network[6] at a cost upwards of £100,000 (equivalent to £11,800,000 in 2023).

3. c. 87), and the extension from Parkhead to Selly Oak Junction with the Oxford and Birmingham Canal, including the Gorsty Hill and Lappal Tunnels under the Selly Oak Canal Act 1793 (33 Geo.