London Banter - View Single Post

Martin Underwood · November 9th 06, 11:05 AM posted to uk.transport.london

Paul Scott wrote in message
:

"Martin Underwood" a@b wrote in message
...

So why have the supports of the old bridge been left behind?

The bridge was of cast-iron construction and would have had scrap
value. The masonry supports had no value and, presumably, there
was no funding at the time to remove them for aesthetic reasons.
However, I
like ruins like this and hope they will stay as they are.

See my other post, the easternmost piers are to be used by the new
Blackfriars station, so must be in reasonable condition - IIRC the
tops are properly capped off to waterproof them as well.

Paul

Before the old part of the bridge was demoloished, was the station
wider (ie did it extend west towards the road bridge) or did the
extra tracks merge into the existing ones just south of the roofed
section? Likewise on the south bank, did the tracks merge into the
existing ones before the start of the long north-south building, or
was that built after the bridge was demolished?

The new bridge was built 20 years after the older bridge (1862), to
provide space for additional tracks, the older bridge went out of use
when heavier trains became the norm in the 1950s, but the deck wasn't
removed until 1984.

So did the old bridge have a straight-line access to the trackbed coming
from the south and the station to the north, or was there a sharp kink in
the track at each end as *appears* to be necessary if it was connected
nowadays? I presume there was not a kink: the original bridge would have
been built inline with the track and the platforms and maybe the new bridge
would have had the deviated kinked route, though track has probably been
slewed since the new bridge became the only one.

Was the bridge deck demolished (rather than simply being left unused)
because it had become unsafe or for its scrap value?