James Brindley, the Derbyshire born canal builder, constructed the first canal in the county in 1777: a branch of the Grand Trunk, later called the Trent and Mersey. The canal ran from the navigable River Trent at Shardlow to Liverpool. Two years later the Erewash Canal, financed by the colliery masters in the Erewash valley coalfields, was engineered by William Jessop. It ran from Langley Mill to meet the River Trent at Sawley, less than three miles from Shardlow.

Tolls levied by the canal companies soon repaid construction and maintenance costs. The main commodity was coal - its price had been lowered by half as a result of the more efficient means of transport, benefitting industry and opening up wider markets for the coal producers.

This generated some Local support for a canal in Cromford.The success of the Trent & Mersey and Erewash canals led to calls from the owners of companies further north for a waterway to move their materials and products quickly and cheaply. Cromford Canal was first proposed in 1788 and Richard Arkwright was one of the supporters; he needed easier access to Liverpool for bringing in raw cotton; a quicker way of sending his thread to the knitters of Nottingham and the opening up of more markets. Also involved were the Gells of Hopton who were involved in lead mining, the Hurts of Alderwasley who owned coke-fired furnaces at Morley Park, Benjamin Outram and Francis Beresford. These last two had interests in coal and iron, and limeworks which burnt limestone quarried at Crich. Their works at Butterley were on the proposed line of the canal.

Prior to the 19th century, the growth of the canals had given rise to an area of housing known as Langley Bridge. The Erewash Canal in 1779, the Cromford Canal in 1794, and the Nottingham Canal in 1796, all used the valley of the River Erewash, and together brought about the early prosperity of the area through the movement of coal, in order to satisfy the southern hunger of the industrial centres of Nottingham and Leicester.

Although housing and wharves were built to sustain the canal age around the area of Langley Bridge in Nottinghamshire, where the three canals converged, it was the development of the Midland Railway, a little further west, in 1847, which promoted the development of Langley Mill through the resulting move of the centre of the village over the River Erewash into Derbyshire. Langly mill was soon converging with the nearby village of Heanor.