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Description: | Showing Rabbit Banks, Gateshead and Newcastle Quayside. The High Level bridge, commissioned by the York, Newcastle & Berwick Railway Company, was designed on a ‘high level’ by Robert Stephenson to divert traffic away from the steep slopes of Bottle Bank and Dean Street. It was formally opened by Queen Victoria in 1849 and was the most importance advance in a Tyne river crossing since the first bridging of the Tyne. Largely built by the Gateshead firm of iron makers, Hawkes Crawshay. The total weight of iron used was 5,050 tons which cost £112,000. The total cost of the bridge was £491,000, although this included the cost of land needed for the approaches. The overall length of the bridge is approximately 1,400 feet (425.6m), The bridge was designed to carry both rail and road traffic. It took the railway system across the Tyne for the first time which meant that passengers travelling north, for example, no longer had to leave the train at Gateshead, walk across the bridge or be taken by ferry, and then get into a train on the other side. In 1922, the bridge was strengthened to take trams. It was freed from tolls in 1937. The High Level Bridge has been in danger on 3 separate occasions. The first was the disastrous explosion and fire of 1854, then 1866 when a fire broke out in The Close, Newcastle and finally in 1940 when a bomb narrowly missed it, falling onto an oil warehouse on the quay. | Format: | image/jpeg | License: | http://www.asaplive.com/Lco/Lco.cfm?ccs=629&cs=2674&Preview=1 | Publisher: | Gateshead Council | Rights holder: | Gateshead Council | Subjects: | Bridges Tyne Riverside General Views | Temporal: | name=Victorian; start=1837; end=1901; | Source: | iSee Gateshead | Creator: | Unknown | Identifier: | http://isee.gateshead.gov.uk/detail.php?... | Language: | en-GB | Format: | image/jpeg | Go to resource |
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