Description: Looking north along the disused and reed-filled Nottingham Canal with Cossall Road to the right and Cossall village visible in the right distance. The overflow in the foreground had been recently repaired when this photo was taken and was provided to drain surplus water from the canal into a nameless tributary of the River Erewash. This brook also marks the parish boundary between Cossall and Trowell, a short distance behind the photographer.
The Nottingham Canal extended from the River Trent at Nottingham in a generally north-westerly direction for 14.7 miles (23.6 kilometres) via Lenton, Radford, Wollaton, Trowell, Cossall, and Awsworth to Langley Mill where it connected with the Cromford and Erewash Canals. Its main purpose was the movement of coal from mines in the Erewash Valley to Nottingham. Opened in 1796, it was later acquired by the Great Northern Railway but, apart from the Nottingham-Lenton section (which was transferred to the Trent Navigation Company and, via its link with the Beeston Canal, remains in use today), it was abandoned in 1936.