Bridge 195 On Leeds Liverpool Canal – Riddlesden, UK
Posted by: dtrebilc
N 53° 53.318 W 001° 54.737
30U E 571487 N 5971678
The Leeds Liverpool canal is the longest canal in Northern England.
Waymark Code: WMJ44D
Location: Yorkshire, United Kingdom
Date Posted: 09/20/2013
Views: 2
The canal is 127.25 miles long and flows from the inland woollen town of Leeds to the coastal sea port of Liverpool, crossing the Pennines along the way. Work on the canal started in 1770 and built in a number of sections and was finally completed in 1816.
The canal is no longer operational for commercial traffic but is popular with leisure boaters.
This steel counterweight swing bridge is also known as Booths bridge and was built to give access to farm fields.
The Moveable Bridges of Britain
website tells us “John Powell reports that the old timber bridge was replaced by a counterweighted steel swing bridge probably around 1980.
John comments that the sludge deposited in the tail well indicates the way that the water level can vary, causing flooding of the well and depositing debris around the cannon-ball pintle, very often requiring high pressure water hoses to free the bearings to avoid an expensive deck-lifting operation.”
The bridge is always locked in position across the canal and boat owners carry the anti-vandal key to unlock the bridge when they wish to pass along the canal.
It is manually operated with a simple lever arm to push and pull the bridge into position.
A sign next to the push arm has the following operating instructions.
Bridge 195,
Booths
Swing Bridge
To open bridge
Use handcuff key to unlock anti-vandal
locking mechanism
Use push arm to fully open bridge
To close bridge
Use push arm to close bridge fully
Relock anti-vandal lock mechanism
Please ensure bridge
is not left unlocked