Peak District - Rivers

Rivers

The high moorland plateau of the Dark Peak and the high ridges of the White Peak are the sources of many rivers. In a report for the Manchester Corporation, the engineer John Frederick Bateman wrote in 1846:

Within ten or twelve miles of Manchester, and six or seven miles from the existing reservoirs at Gorton, there is this tract of mountain land abounding with springs of the purest quality. Its physical and geological features offer such peculiar features for the collection, storage and supply of water for the use of the towns in the plains below that I am surprised that they have been overlooked. —John Frederick Bateman,

He was referring to Longdendale, and the upper valley of the River Etherow. The western side of the Peak District is drained by the rivers Etherow, Goyt, and Tame, which are tributaries of the River Mersey. The north east is drained by tributaries of the River Don, itself a tributary of the Yorkshire Ouse. Of the tributaries of the River Trent, that drain the south and east, the River Derwent is the most prominent. It rises in the Peak District on Bleaklow just east of Glossop and flows through the Upper Derwent Valley with its three reservoirs, the Howden Reservoir, Derwent Reservoir and Ladybower Reservoir. The River Noe and the River Wye are tributaries. The River Manifold and River Dove, rivers of the south west whose sources are on Axe Edge Moor, also flow into the Trent, while the River Dane flows into the River Weaver.