Loss of the Derwent crossing due to development has resulted in an innovative engineering solution called the Derby Arm being proposed, as a way of transferring boats across the river.

Although the River Derwent had been used for transport from the Trent since ancient times, it was winding and shallow in many places, silting frequently.

In 1703, Sorocold attended Parliament to give evidence for a scheme which involved four new cuts, with weirs and locks, on a 10-mile (16 km) stretch of the river.

in 1720, and the work enabled boats to reach Derby in January 1721, but it was still difficult to navigate in periods of flood or dry weather.

By August 1792, the first scheme had grown to include a branch to Smithy House near Denby, another to Newhall and Swadlincote, and a third to Cheadle in Staffordshire, following a route through Sudbury and Uttoxeter.

When Benjamin Outram was asked to carry out surveys later that year, it had been reduced to a more sensible size, and he estimated that the construction of a broad canal from Swarkestone to Smithy Houses, with a branch from Derby to the Erewash Canal at Sandiacre, including the purchase of the Derwent Navigation Company, would cost £60,000[3] (equivalent to £9.23 million in 2023).

[5] This, the Derby Canal Railway, but known locally, as the Little Eaton Gangway, was therefore one of the first to be publicly subscribed, and would save the construction of six locks.

Outram also proposed to save some £4,000 by dispensing with the aqueduct and, instead, building a weir to raise the river level to form a basin adjacent to the Morledge, with locks connecting it to each branch of the canal.

A short branch from the basin led via Phoenix lock to the river above a weir at St. Mary's Bridge, which gave access to the Darley Abbey mills.

From the basin the canal fell into a lock before crossing the mill race (which still runs beside Bass's Recreation Ground) by way of the cast-iron aqueduct arriving at Gandy's Wharf roughly where the Cockpit island is now.

It followed the line of the mill race before passing behind what became the Locomotive Works (now Pride Park), before turning sharply southwards towards Chellaston descending through Shelton and Fullen's locks.

Each waggon carried a box of coal, with a load of between 1.65 and 1.87 tons, which was transferred to a barge at Little Eaton wharf by a crane.

From Smithy Houses, several private lines served the Denby Main colliery and other mines in the locality.

Aqueducts up to that time had been made of stone, but several short arches would have been necessary, causing obstruction to the flow of the stream.

[9] In 1838 the canal was diverted away from the River Derwent at Borrowash[14] to allow construction of the Midland Counties Railway line between Derby and Long Eaton.

A. Mallender, who lived in the locality, asked the fledgling Inland Waterways Association to help mount a campaign for its revival in 1947.

The author Tom Rolt made a series of cruises on threatened waterways at this time, but could not obtain permission to navigate the Derby Canal.

Rolt took his case to the Ministry of Transport, seeking to invoke the conditions of the Railway and Canal Traffic Act 1888 (51 & 52 Vict.

The Times national newspaper carried details of the event, and a subsequent meeting held on 27 May called for a public enquiry into how best to restore the canal for commercial and amenity use.

It included detailed plans for restoration, and concluded that the cost for reinstating the 14-mile (23 km) main line would be £17.3 million.

[23] In early 1996, construction of the Derby Bypass threatened to sever the line at Swarkestone, although the Department of Transport suggested that a navigable culvert could be provided if the Canal Society paid for it.

By this time, the estimated cost of restoration had risen to £34 million, but they launched a major initiative to raise the funding over a 10-year period.

[27] Grants from the Derbyshire City Partnership received from 2008 enabled the Trust Development Group to begin the process of applying for outline planning permission for reinstatement.

An innovative solution has been suggested in the form of the Derby Arm, which would transport a caisson containing water and a boat in a semi-circular arc from one side of the river to the other.

[29] Plans for the restoration were threatened in 2013 when the route of High Speed 2, a high-speed rail link from London to Birmingham, Manchester and York, were published.

The weir built across the river to form the Derwent Basin still exists behind the Council House, downstream of the Exeter Bridge, and the timber causeway on trestles, which was used as the towpath, remained until 1959.

[32] The lock-keepers cottage at Sandiacre Lock also dates from around the time of the opening of the canal, and although it has additional windows added in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, most of it is original.