View the upcoming World Canal Conferences up to three years ahead. Scroll down to see the venues and key themes of all the past events since 1988 (see the maps under the list).
If you would like to host the World Canals Conference, please read the conference hosting criteria and visit the application page.
Upcoming Conferences
Buffalo invites the world’s canal community to New York State’s ‘Queen City’ in September 2025 to help celebrate the 200th anniversary of the completion of the Erie Canal.
New York’s ‘Grand Canal’ provided the first all-water link between the Atlantic Ocean and the upper Great Lakes, altering patterns of settlement, agriculture, and industrialization throughout eastern North America. The Erie Canal remains in service today and endures as a testament to the vision and imagination of New Yorkers who dared to dream that a narrow ribbon of waterway, carved through 363 miles (584km) of forests and wetlands could transform their state and a young nation.
The ‘bicentennial’ conference is co-hosted by the City of Buffalo, the Erie Canalway National Heritage Corridor, and the New York State Canal Corporation, the agency that operates all four branches of the state’s 524 mile (843 km) canal system.
Conference events will include visits to the replica canal boat Seneca Chief that will recreate Governor DeWitt Clinton’s 1825 journey from Buffalo to the “Wedding of the Waters” ceremony in New York Harbor. Study tours will feature historic canal sites and revitalization projects along the Erie Canal. Attendees will learn about operations, sustainability, tourism, and heritage development at sessions presented by waterway experts from around the world.
DATES TO BE CONFIRMED
Guilin and Xing’an (a county under Guilin’s jurisdiction) in Guangxi Autonomous Region, China, will host the WCC in October 2026. Here lies one of the oldest Chinese canals connecting the Yangtze and Pearl River basins: the Lingqu Canal. Xing’an is where water is diverted into the canal from the northward-flowing Xiang River. It is also home to the Lingqu Canal Museum. The conference will offer unique opportunities to cruise on the Lijiang River, south from Guilin, where the scenery is said to be ‘best under heaven’.
Canal and waterfront restoration in constrained urban environments will be a key theme. We will also explore how to integrate the development of ancient canals with modern waterways, including the Pinglu and Xianggui canals. China is working to build the Pinglu Canal, approximately 500 km away from the Lingqu Canal. With its completion, hinterland and sea are linked. The newly planned Xianggui Canal, situated about 60 km southeast of the Lingqu Canal, is set to reconnect the largest and busiest water systems in China – the Yangtze River and the Pearl River.
Past Conferences
The conference theme was Challenges between ecology and economic use – sustainable revitalisation of canals focusing on nature.
Water runs through the history of Bydgoszcz and has contributed to its growth over the centuries. Construction of the Bydgoszcz Canal in 1773-1774 connected the city with the West of Europe, further stimulating economic growth. Today, the Bydgoszcz Canal is Poland’s oldest canal still in operation and the city sits at a crossing of inland waterways linking the east and west of Europe, including the navigable transport route known as Waterway E40, connecting the Baltic Sea and the Black Sea, and E70, which runs from Antwerp in Belgium to Vilnius in Lithuania.
IWI hosted a series of webinars covering important waterway issues presented by experts from all over the world. Topics included working with volunteer organisations to manage canals, how inland waterways boating can have less environmental impact, urban regeneration associated with canal restoration, and what makes China’s Lingqu Canal unique.
The presentations are free to view on IWI’s YouTube channel:
https://www.youtube.com/@IWIWorldCanalsConference
The theme of the conference, held on May 30-June 3 2022, was Reshaping Landscapes – Waterways in Transition. There is an illustrated report by Janet Gascoigne on the conference, including highlights of the pre- and post-conference tours to Berlin and the Finow Canal, including the two ship lifts at Niederfinow, then to Magdeburg and the Elbe crossing, finishing in Lutherstadt Wittenberg on the River Elbe.
The Chesapeake and Ohio Canal Association hosted the WCC in Hagerstown, Maryland, USA, in collaboration with Visit Hagerstown and the US National Park Service.
The event commemorated the 50th anniversary of creation of the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal National Historical Park. Substantial restoration works have been completed on significant sections of the canal, particularly in Georgetown, Washington, and in Williamsport, Maryland, close to Hagerstown.
The C&O and its project partners were delighted to be show delegates one of America’s most emblematic canals.
The conference was held in Yangzhou, China. The theme, “The role of Canals in CityBetterment and Ecological Restoration”, invited the delegates to discuss how to maximize the roles of canals in improving modern human habitat from such perspectives as the restoration and maintenance of water ecology, the rational management of urban spaces as well as perfection of functions, and canal heritage and tourism development.
Inland waterways have an important role to play in building healthy, beautiful, habitable, and convenient cities.
The conference was based at Athlone on the Shannon Navigation. The theme was
“Restoring – Regenerating – Re-imagining”. Pre- and post-conference tours visited other key waterways sites throughout Ireland. The event was organised jointly by Waterways Ireland and the Inland Waterways Association of Ireland, and was attended by over 300 delegates, including 15 from the World Canal Cities Organisation and partners in China, who were able to promote next year’s conference which is at Yangzhou and Wuxi on the Grand Canal.
Read our blog on the highly successful World Canals Conference organised by the New York State Canal Corporation, the Erie Canalway National Heritage Corridor and Visit Syracuse, on September 24-28, 2017. More than 350 delegates took part in the event.
The theme of the conference was “Our Vital Waterways: Agents of Transformation”.
The event celebrated the bicentennial of the Erie Canal – the waterway that transformed America.
The conference themes were:
- Technical challenges and innovation,
- Growing tourism and commercialising the assets,
- Waterways as a driver for regeneration, and
- Safeguarding the heritage of our waterways.
Theme: the Western Flemish canals and inland waterways (hinterland of the North Sea region in Flanders).
Themes:
- Canals as cultural heritage
- Infrastructure & transport
- Tourism & Economy
- Multifunctional uses & environment
Themes: Canals as living heritage to be preserved; transport & tourism; analysis of waterway networks; governance, and waterway development strategies.
Pre-conference tour on the Canal du Midi and post-conference tour on the Tarn in Albi, the river Lot and the Canal de Garonne
Theme: Grand Canal, Living Heritage.
Pre-conference tour to Beijing, Xi’an, Chongqing and cruise on the Yangtze River.
Theme: Grand Canal, Living Heritage.
Pre-conference tour to Beijing, Xi’an, Chongqing and cruise on the Yangtze River.
Theme: Canals in the Community Setting, New York State and Worldwide: Challenges and Opportunities
Theme: East and west will meet: canals and waterways for tomorrow’s world (Vode Vojvodine & Danube Propeller)
Theme: Managing Canal Corridors in the 21st Century
Theme: Creating sustainable waterside communities: involving volunteers and the community alongside professionals when designing and delivering waterfront regeneration.
