Building record MAB26333 - RIVER DEE RAILWAY BRIDGE

Railway bridge built by Lock and Errington 1848.

Railway bridge built by Lock and Errington 1848. This 11-span railway bridge takes trains over the river Dee. It has 7 principal spans with steel trussed (originally timber) on granite and sandstone piers, with cutwaters forming a crenellated parapet for mesh railings. There are four round-arched sandstone approach spans with polished arch rings and a coped parapet. In 1850 the first trains arrived in Aberdeen. At that time the line terminated at Ferryhill. In 1854 the first Joint Station at Guild Street was opened and from that date trains passed through Ferryhill on their way to the Joint Station. The proposed route of the railway to its then terminus at the foot of Market Street did not interfere with many built-up areas of great value, so the right-of-way seems to have been acquired almost without comment in the contemporary press. The main local engineering tasks which lay ahead were the construction of the arched viaduct along the north bank of the River Dee, and the bridge over the river. Formal Approval was granted in 1845 to the Aberdeen Railway Company for these works, and Macdonald and Leslie of Aberdeen, were appointed contractors for the bridge over the Dee at Polmuir, and also for the stone-arched viaduct between Ferryhill Foundry and Guild Street. The first locomotive for the Aberdeen Railway was built in Simpson's York Place Iron Works in 1847, shortly before its closure in 1849. It was reported in November 1845 that 'some 40 or 50 labourers commenced preliminary operations on that portion of the line which lies between the proposed terminus and the passage across the Dee'. One of the hazards of the construction of the Dee bridge was possible damage from timber logs being floated downstream from the Deeside Forests to the Shipyards in Aberdeen, and it was necessary in May 1846 to issue a Public Notice citing the 1812 Act of Parliament in an attempt to stop this practice, to protect the coffer dam, the frames and the centerings that would temporarily support the bridge during its construction, from June 1846 to June 1848. In September 1846, the Aberdeen Journal brought news that there had been a collapse of some 3 railway arches near Devanha Brewery, the centerings having been removed some 10 days earlier. Eleven men were buried in the ruins, of whom 7 were killed outright. The Railway Directors comment on the tragedy was: 'Unless for the loss of human life involved in this accident, it is not important in itself, and will not retard the final completion of the undertaking'. In October 1847, the partially completed bridge was in danger when the river Dee, after 2 days of continuous heavy rain, rose to within a short distance of the height reached in the record spate of 1829, and parts of the service erections on the bridge were carried away. On Monday April 1st 1850, an auspicious date, the line was opened to passenger traffic, and the first scheduled train to Aberdeen swung over the new bridge and steamed to a halt in Ferryhill Station. The original bridge, as constructed by the Aberdeen Railway Company, included wooden beams on stone foundations, but from the 1880s onwards, these were replaced by iron girders as a major programme of bridge improvements to accommodate heavier trains.

Period Notes
Listed 29/02/2000

ABERDEEN CITY LIBRARIES, 2005, ABERDEEN'S BRIDGES OVER THE DEE AND DON (Bibliographic reference). SAB8338.

Record last edited

Nov 4 2022 2:25PM