Swing Bridge Number 3 On Aire And Calder Navigation - Pollington, UK
Posted by: 
dtrebilc
N 53° 39.911 W 001° 03.988
30U E 627750 N 5948007
This large manually operated swing bridge is an accommodation bridge for a nearby farm.
Waymark Code: WMRK49
Location: Yorkshire, United Kingdom
Date Posted: 07/02/2016
Views: 2
The Aire and Calder Navigation is a river and canal system of the River Aire and the River Calder in the metropolitan county of West Yorkshire, England. The first improvements to the rivers above Knottingley were completed in 1704 when the Aire was made navigable to Leeds and the Calder to Wakefield, by the construction of 16 locks. Lock sizes were increased several times, as was the depth of water, to enable larger boats to use the system.
Steam tugs were introduced in 1831. In the 1860s, compartment boats were introduced, later called Tom Puddings, from which coal was unloaded into ships by large hydraulic hoists. This system enabled the canal to carry at its peak more than 1.5 million tons of coal per year, and was not abandoned until 1986. To handle trains of compartments, many of the locks were lengthened to 450 feet (140 m).
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The Swing Bridge
The bridge is located to the east of the nearby Pollington Lock and is usually left in the open position and only closed whilst the farmer needs to use the bridge. It is operated by a vertical windlass on the north bank of the canal with metal chains connecting to the side of the bridge.
When there was a large volume of commercial traffic on the canal the lock keeper used to operate both the lock and the swing bridge and there is a small hut next to the bridge. However most commercial traffic ceased to operate at the end of 2015, and both the lock and the bridge are operated by users, although in the case of the lock the gates are powered whereas the bridge remains manually operated.
Although the bridge is wide and strong enough to take vehicles its use is restricted to farm use and so only takes farm vehicles and animals.
Whilst I was nearby the bridge was opened to allow a flock of sheep to be moved to a field on the opposite canal bank. It needed two people to operate the windlass.