Already Friedrich August I. (1763-1827) initiated the planning of a waterway connecting Leipzig with the Saale and Unstrut rivers. However, the Napoleonic Wars from 1805 to 1815 halted these plans, and the project was not pursued further. At the initiative of Leipzig entrepreneur and city councilor Karl Heine, who placed the project at the center of Leipzig's economic development, shaft work for a canal began at the White Elster in 1856. The last construction phase was completed in 1898, achieving a length of approximately 2.6 km. This canal was named after its initiator, the Karl-Heine Canal. The Elster-Saale Canal was intended to connect to the Karl-Heine Canal via the Lindenauer Hafen, thereby establishing a connection through downtown Leipzig to the White Elster. In 2007, the city of Leipzig decided to complete the missing connection of about 530 meters.