 Railway expansion continued, with both the Midland Railway and the Great Northern Railway building tracks along the Nutbrook valley, which between them included seven bridges over the canal by 1880.The canal company attempted to sell itself to the Great Northern Railway in 1876, but the railway company declined to buy.The condition of the canal continued to decline, with subsidence occurring at Shipley and under the West Hallam reservoir, on Mapperley Brook, in 1879.