dayZedandconFUSED 06-11
Neil Young Run - Down By The River
Wednesday the 5th of October dawned bright and dry if a little breezy for our run to the Middlesborough Transporter Bridge. We met at the "dogwalkers" car park and apart from John and me in my roadster there was Dave York in his RV8 and that was it.
Undeterred we set off travelling via Sheriff Hutton and Helmsley and onto the B1257 to Stokesley. From there we headed for the A174 and a short dash down the dual carriageway and on to the very busy A66 with all the HGVs and other commercial traffic.
We arrived at the bridge and found parking space in an adjacent car park and went to the visitor centre. The bridge was built by Sir William Arrol and Co Ltd of Glasgow and opened in 1911 and cost £68,000 (over £5 million today). It took 14 months to build.. There are only two other bridges of this type left in the country, one in Newport, South Wales, and one in Warrington but the one in Middlesborough is the longest being 851 feet in length. The bridge has appeared in the film "Billy Elliot and on TV in "The Fast Show", "Spender" and was even shown being dismantled and shipped to the USA in the final series of "Auf Wiedersehen, Pet". This resulted in a number of telephone calls to the local council from worried people who thought that the bridge was being pulled down. The bridge is now a grade 2 listed building and continues to operate six days a week. Sundays are reserved for bungee jumpers abseilers and zip liners.
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So after looking in the winding house and reading various commemorative plaques we went and got our cars and drove onto the gondola to cross the river and what a smooth crossing it was, no real sense of moving at all. Once over to the other side we parked up in a small lay-by. As well as carrying people and vehicles the bridge also carries oxygen, there is a large oxygen pipe that runs up one end of the bridge, across the top and down the other side but there is no indication of which direction the gas flows in.
We continued on our way passing through scenic, picturesque Port Clarence and then crossed back over the River Tees on the Newport Bridge. This is the bridge that is just to the east of the A19 flyover and is of the vertical lifting type. The bridge was built in 1934, was the first vertical lift bridge built in this country and is the heaviest of its type in the world. The lifting span and counterweights weighing in at 5400 tons and a total of 8000tons of steel in the bridge and approach spans. The bridge could be lifted in 90 seconds using two 325hp electric motors with a 450hp petrol engine on standby. It could also be raised by hand but this was estimated to take eight hours for its crew of twelve. The bridge was built for the sum of £437,000 by Dorman Long of Middlesborough who also built the Tyne Bridge and Sydney Harbour Bridge.
Once back on the A66 we retraced our steps to Great Broughton where refreshments were taken at the Bay Horse. They have a large car park and although it was very busy we found room at the front facing on to the road. After a good lunch we headed home, the weather still being kind to us by staying dry. Helmsley was surprisingly busy as we passed through with the car park in the market place looking full. We both arrived home safely with another run completed.