"The Recoumène (or Recoumène) viaduct is a railway bridge built from 1921 to 1925 for the so-called "transcévenole" railway line which was to link Le Puy (Haute-Loire) to Aubenas (Ardèche). This line not having been completed, the viaduct has never been put into service1 and has never seen a train pass.
The Recoumène viaduct is located in Haute-Loire, near Monastier-sur-Gazeille, a tourist center made famous by Robert-Louis Stevenson. It crosses the Gazeille, a small tributary of the Loire descending from Mont Mézenc, and the departmental road 535 which connects Le Puy to Privas. According to the Napoleonic cadastre, the Gazeille was formerly called La Ricomène. It is this name that was used at the time, but in a slightly modified form, for the designation of this viaduct.
History
Designed by bridge and road engineer Paul Séjourné, head of the construction department at the PLM company and the last great specialist in masonry construction for the railways. The site was managed by engineers Ortigues and Ollanier and built by the Ch. Milliat company.
The viaduct, entirely in basalt (the rock of the country), is 270 meters long, and has 8 semicircular arches with an opening of 25 meters. Established in a severe ramp of 21‰ (21 mm for 1,000 mm), it dominates the river from 65.60m. It is built in a curve, with a horizontal radius of 325 meters without buttresses, piles of abutments, or chainings. Thanks to the use of cement mortar, the piles are very thin.
The work was almost finished when the PLM company, on October 9, 1925, received the ministerial decision to carry out only the interventions "strictly essential to ensure the conservation of the work carried out to date". The Le Monastier-Lavelade section was downgraded in 1937, that of Brives-Le Monastier in 1941.
In the words of Auguste Jouret, who participated in the construction of the viaduct at the start of his engineering career: “The Recoumène viaduct is the ultimate piece of bravery of our time. Plastered on a severe landscape, it offers itself in its racy and cold elegance, a gratuitous homage to basalt. Free indeed because, authentic work of art, it ultimately only serves to be looked at”.
The bridge was listed as a historical monument on August 21, 1989.
Leisure
Integrated in a pedestrian, equestrian and mountain bike tourist route, bungee jumping of 65 meters."