tarboat's photos with the keyword: suspension bridge

Under an Act of 1825 the New River Ancholme was straightened, widened and deepened, with existing bridges replaced with single span structures. At Horkstow a bridge served a brickworks on the western side and this was replaced by this, the only suspension bridge designed by Sir John Rennie. It was completed in 1836 under the supervision of site engineer Adam Smith, with the ironwork supplied by Messrs John and Edward Walker of Gospel Oak Ironworks, Tipton, Staffordshire. In 1979 the bridge was severely damaged when the tractor unit of a 23 ton articulated lorry fell through the deck into the river destroying a quarter of the wooden bridge deck and damaging the attached suspension rods. During the 1990s the deck was rebuilt in tropical hardwood and the underground sections of the suspension chains replaced with high tensile steel. It is now listed Grade 2*.