Sometimes called "The Stone Coal Turnpike", the lower canal () was built by the Lehigh Navigation Company as a "toll road" to supply coal to Eastern seaboard cities between 1818 and 1820 (downriver traffic only). It was rebuilt (with locks supporting two-way traffic) between 1827 and 1829 by the Lehigh Coal & Navigation Company, and remained in operation until 1931. The lower canal connected the eastern part of the southern Coal Region to the Delaware River basin (primarily the Panther Creek Valley, Nesquehoning Creek Valley and mines in Beaver Meadows and along Black Creek), connecting via Penn Haven Junction to the canal head at Mauch Chunk (now Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania).