lockage

Noun

lockage (countable and uncountable, plural lockages)

1. Materials for locks in a canal.
2. The works forming a canal lock or locks.
   • This line had been constructed as provided for in the Act of incorporation of May 7, 1794, to avoid the use of lockage on the branch canals authorised as feeders to the main waterway.1952 April, C. R. Clinker and Gordon Biddle, “Swannington and Ticknall Today”, in Railway Magazine, page 265
3. A toll or fee paid for transporting a vessel through the locks of a canal.
4. (archaic) The total height difference (elevation and descent) made by the locks of a canal.
   • 1829, De Witt Clinton, a letter
   • The entire lockage will be about fifty feet.

   Synonyms:

   lift, canal lift

5. The use or transit of a canal lock.
6. (colloquial) A situation where things lock together.
   • But first, a bunch of songs, some down-home cracker-barrel advice, a few gallons of lemonade, pratfalls and cornball humour and her first onscreen kiss — which begins barely half in camera range and moves out of sight before real lip lockage commences.2009 April 10, Linda Barnard, “Hannah Montana: The Movie: Down-home girl”, in Toronto Star