Question: Which canal  is a major canal in central Maricopa County that led to the founding of several communities, now among the wealthier neighborhoods of suburban Phoenix, in the late 1880s,the Arizona Canal or the Pennsylvania Canal?

 The Canal and Works were constructed and assembled over several decades beginning in 1824, the year of the first enabling act and budget items.  It should be understood the "first use of any railway" in North America was the year 1826, so the newspapers and the Pennsylvania Assembly of 1824 applied the term then to the proposed Right of ways mainly for the canals of the Main Line of Public Works to be built across the southern part of Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania Canal "(or sometimes Pennsylvania Canal system)" refers generally to a complex system of transportation infrastructure improvements including canals, dams, locks, tow paths, aqueducts, and viaducts.  Enacted before Railroads gestated during their infancy, the focus of the act was to create through building a canal system, the capability to ship heavy or bulk goods and connect Philadelphia to Pittsburgh—and "more importantly"—and "beyond" to the "new growth markets" in the developing territories reached by the Ohio River now called the midwest.  Later, when updated in 1837 to reflect the experience of twelve years of toddler-railways, the term was also applied to railroads and new canals to be added to the state transportation system.  As a crowning achievement, the Main Line of Public Works and the Pennsylvania Canal system topped 2100 ft in elevation by erecting the Allegheny Portage Railroad, which used a system of five inclines and five planes on each side of the Eastern Continental Divide at Cresson Pass in Cambria County to actually haul wheeled flat cars, which had halved canal boats placed on them, up and over the Allegheny Front and connect Pittsburgh to the Susquehanna.  When finished in 1834 the trip from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh could be made in 3–5 days, weather conditions depending. <SEP> Philadelphia and Columbia Railroad (P&CR) (1834) was one of the earliest commercial railroads in the United States, running 82 mi from Philadelphia to Columbia, Pennsylvania, it was built by the Pennsylvania Canal Commission in lieu of a canal from Columbia to Philadelphia; in 1857 it became part of the Pennsylvania Railroad, and its trackage lives on today operated by Norfolk-Southern.  The Philadelphia and Columbia Railroad's western terminus was located near the former ferry site known as Wright's Ferry, in the town once of that name, but now Columbia in Lancaster County.  There the P&CR met with the Pennsylvania Canal—navigations and improvements on the Susquehanna River east bank approximately 30 mi south of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.  Most of its right-of-way was obtained by the actions of the Pennsylvania Canal Commission which operated the railroad under the various enabling acts of the Pennsylvania legislature known as the Main Line of Public Works in support of a far sighted plan to link the whole state by canals.  With an engineering study reporting back a finding that obtaining sufficient waters to flood the intended 80+ mile canal from Philadelphia to Columbia, the Canal Commission and legislature authorized the railway on the right of way intended for the canal. <SEP>  Flood irrigation of residential yards is still common in these neighborhoods, using a system of lateral waterways connected via gates to the canal itself.  Like most Valley canals, its banks are popular with joggers and bicyclists. The Arizona Canal is a major canal in central Maricopa County that led to the founding of several communities, now among the wealthier neighborhoods of suburban Phoenix, in the late 1880s. <SEP> Heaton is a populated place situated in Pinal County, Arizona.  Originally called Maricopa Station, it served as a stop on the railroad line, where passengers transferred to stagecoach.  The post office at this location was simply named Maricopa.  During a land boom in the late 1880s, it was thought that this stop would become a railway stop on the line directly connecting to Phoenix.  As expansion into a town was being considered if the planned rail connection became reality, the expanded community was to be named Maricopaville.  In 1887, when the rail line connection went to Maricopa Junction (present day Maricopa) instead, the town's expansion was abandoned, and the name of the town was changed to its current Heaton.  It has an estimated elevation of 1197 ft above sea level.