Bramley-Moore Dock Lifting Bridge
NO LONGER EXTANT
This bridge carried the High Level Coal Branch branch of the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway over Regent Road into Bramley-Moore Dock, Liverpool.
Only rarely was any effort made to make a vertical lift bridge look anything but purely functional. This was an exception, but the effect was imposing rather than appealing. Arguably, a person would have to travel to Paris to find an example with a touch of artistic flair, where the Rue de Crimée Lifting Bridge lives on. The Liverpool and Paris bridges both boasted large wheels and hydraulic rams.
The Liverpool bridge only need to lifted for the passage of abnormal loads. The presence of the adjacent fixed span proved to be an obstacle to the Liverpool Overhead Railway, which was forced to make a excursion to ground level to get under the bridge.
Built c.1854. The girders of the lifting span, and its fixed neighbours, were typical of those designed by William Fairbairn, and were probably built by William Fairbairn and Sons.
See here and here for photographs taken from rail level in 1964.