Bangor Bridge (also known as the Bangor-on-Dee Bridge) is a

Grade I listed In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Hi ...

bridge A bridge is a structure built to Span (engineering), span a physical obstacle (such as a body of water, valley, road, or railway) without blocking the path underneath. It is constructed for the purpose of providing passage over the obstacle, whi ...

crossing the River Dee in

Bangor-on-Dee Bangor-on-Dee ( or Welsh Language Commissioner, standardised ) is a village and Community (Wales), community in Wrexham County Borough, Wales, on the banks of the River Dee, Wales, River Dee. Until 1974 it was in the exclave of Flintshire (histo ...

Wrexham County Borough Wrexham County Borough () is a Principal areas of Wales, county borough, with city status in the United Kingdom, city status, in the North East Wales, north-east of Wales. It borders the English ceremonial counties of Cheshire and Shropshire to ...

, Wales. It is situated on the

community A community is a social unit (a group of people) with a shared socially-significant characteristic, such as place, set of norms, culture, religion, values, customs, or identity. Communities may share a sense of place situated in a given g ...

boundary between

Bangor-is-y-Coed Bangor-on-Dee ( or standardised ) is a village and community in Wrexham County Borough, Wales, on the banks of the River Dee. Until 1974 it was in the exclave of Flintshire known as the Maelor Saesneg, and from 1974 to 1996 in the county of Clw ...

and

Sesswick Sesswick is a community in Wrexham County Borough, Wales. It lies south-east of Wrexham near Marchwiel. The population of the community at the 2011 Census was 609. The area was historically part of Denbighshire, where it was one of the townshi ...

. Located to the west of Bangor-on-Dee, it connects the village's

high street High Street is a common street name for the primary business street of a city, town, or village, especially in the United Kingdom and Commonwealth. It implies that it is the focal point for business, especially shopping. It is also a metonym fo ...

and the

A525 A525 may refer to: * A525 road, a road in England * Alpine A525, used by Alpine F1 Team Alpine F1 Team, currently racing as BWT Alpine F1 Team for sponsorship reasons, is the name under which the Enstone-based Formula One team has been compet ...

road bypass A bypass is a road or highway that avoids or "bypasses" a built-up area, town, or village, to let through traffic flow without interference from local traffic, to reduce congestion in the built-up area, to improve road safety and as replacement ...

. The narrow bridge is a

one-way traffic One-way traffic (or uni-directional traffic) is traffic that moves in a single direction. A one-way street is a street either facilitating only one-way traffic, or designed to direct vehicles to move in one direction. One-way streets typicall ...

bridge, west to east, and is downstream (north) of the Bangor by-pass bridge.

Description

The bridge crosses the River Dee, with the river currently serving as the boundary between the communities of Bangor-is-y-Coed and Sesswick within Wrexham County Borough since 1996. The River Dee at this location, historically served as the boundary between the historic county of

Denbighshire Denbighshire ( ; ) is a county in the north-east of Wales. It borders the Irish Sea to the north, Flintshire to the east, Wrexham to the southeast, Powys to the south, and Gwynedd and Conwy to the west. Rhyl is the largest town, and Ruthi ...

to the west and

Flintshire Flintshire () is a county in the north-east of Wales. It borders the Irish Sea to the north, the Dee Estuary to the north-east, the English county of Cheshire to the east, Wrexham County Borough to the south, and Denbighshire to the west. ...

Maelor Saesneg , also known as English Maelor, comprises one half of the Maelor region on the Welsh side of the Wales-England border, being the area of the Maelor east of the River Dee. The region has changed counties several times, previously being part of C ...

containing Bangor-on-Dee to the east. The bridge is listed by

Cadw (, a Welsh verbal noun meaning "keeping/preserving") is the historic environment service of the Welsh Government and part of the Tourism and Culture group. works to protect the historic buildings and structures, the landscapes and heritage ...

, and described to have a group value with the nearby listed buildings of Bangor-on-Dee

war memorial A war memorial is a building, monument, statue, or other edifice to celebrate a war or victory, or (predominating in modern times) to commemorate those who died or were injured in a war. Symbolism Historical usage It has ...

and the Church of St Dunawd. The cambered bridge's five unequal

elliptic In mathematics, an ellipse is a plane curve surrounding two focal points, such that for all points on the curve, the sum of the two distances to the focal points is a constant. It generalizes a circle, which is the special type of ellipse in ...

al stepped

arch An arch is a curved vertical structure spanning an open space underneath it. Arches may support the load above them, or they may perform a purely decorative role. As a decorative element, the arch dates back to the 4th millennium BC, but stru ...

es are mainly made of

red sandstone Sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate grains, cemented together by another mineral. Sandstones comprise about 20–25% of all sedimentary rocks. Most sandstone is composed o ...

, with some coursed

rubble Rubble is broken stone, of irregular size, shape and texture; undressed especially as a filling-in. Rubble naturally found in the soil is known also as 'brash' (compare cornbrash)."Rubble" def. 2., "Brash n. 2. def. 1. ''Oxford English Dictionar ...

and finely dressed

stone In geology, rock (or stone) is any naturally occurring solid mass or aggregate of minerals or mineraloid matter. It is categorized by the minerals included, its Chemical compound, chemical composition, and the way in which it is formed. Rocks ...

. The bridge has four

buttresses A buttress is an architectural structure built against or projecting from a wall which serves to support or reinforce the wall. Buttresses are fairly common on more ancient (typically Gothic) buildings, as a means of providing support to act a ...

. The

parapet A parapet is a barrier that is an upward extension of a wall at the edge of a roof, terrace, balcony, walkway or other structure. The word comes ultimately from the Italian ''parapetto'' (''parare'' 'to cover/defend' and ''petto'' 'chest/brea ...

s and full height splayed

cutwater A cutwater is the forward part of the prow or stem of a watercraft around the waterline The waterline is the line where the hull of a ship meets the surface of the water. A waterline can also refer to any line on a ship's hull that is paralle ...

s are made of yellow

sandstone Sandstone is a Clastic rock#Sedimentary clastic rocks, clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of grain size, sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate mineral, silicate grains, Cementation (geology), cemented together by another mineral. Sand ...

with refuges on the top. The parapets are also made of large dressed slabs and are apart.

Inigo Jones Inigo Jones (15 July 1573 – 21 June 1652) was an English architect who was the first significant Architecture of England, architect in England in the early modern era and the first to employ Vitruvius, Vitruvian rules of proportion and symmet ...

is speculated to be the bridge's architect, with similar bridges constructed in places such as

Llanrwst ; ) is a market town and Community (Wales), community in Conwy County Borough, Wales. It is on the east bank of the River Conwy and the A470 road, and lies within the historic counties of Wales, historic county boundaries of Denbighshire (histori ...

(

Pont Fawr Pont Fawr (also known as Llanrwst Bridge) crosses the River Conwy in the town of Llanrwst, Conwy County Borough, Wales. Traditionally attributed to the architect Inigo Jones, it was built in around 1636. The bridge is in length and carries vehic ...

) and

Llangollen Llangollen () is a town and community (Wales), community, situated on the River Dee, Wales, River Dee, in Denbighshire, Wales. Its riverside location forms the edge of the Berwyn range, and the Dee Valley section of the Clwydian Range and Dee Val ...

attributed to him. A

scheduled monument In the United Kingdom, a scheduled monument is a nationally important archaeological site or historic building, given protection against unauthorised change. The various pieces of legislation that legally protect heritage assets from damage, visu ...

is also on the site, consisting of a medieval or post-medieval remains of an older bridge.

History

The earliest reports of a bridge at or near this location in historical maps date to 1036, whereas the earliest mention of a medieval wooden design bridge at this location was recorded in 1292. The current bridge is of medieval late 15th or early 16th century origins but the current structure mainly dates to the 17th century, with a notable restoration in 1658, by

. The bridge was repaired several times over its lifespan, including a repair () in 1757 caused by frequent flooding. There was another repair costing () in 1843. Although, described to be "in a state of deterioration", while still used. It was recorded by the

Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales The Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales (RCAHMW; ; ), established in 1908, is a Welsh Government sponsored body concerned with some aspects of the archaeological, architectural and historic environment of Wales. ...

in 1910. The bridge connects to the village's

. Prior to the 1900's the bridge was mainly used by

horse-drawn vehicle A horse-drawn vehicle is a piece of equipment pulled by one or more horses. These vehicles typically have two or four wheels and were used to carry passengers or a load. They were once common worldwide, but they have mostly been replaced by auto ...

s, farm

cart A cart or dray (Australia and New Zealand) is a vehicle designed for transport, using two wheels and normally pulled by draught animals such as horses, donkeys, mules and oxen, or even smaller animals such as goats or large dogs. A handcart ...

s and

pedestrian A pedestrian is a person traveling on foot, by wheelchair or with other mobility aids. Streets and roads often have a designated footpath for pedestrian traffic, called the '' sidewalk'' in North American English, the ''pavement'' in British En ...

s. When motor vehicle usage on the bridge increased, it damaged the bridge, leading to the introduction of traffic lights and weight restrictions on the bridge to limit the damage. In 1970, there was a petition to construct a new bridge and by-pass in the village, with the bridge and by-pass completed in 1978 and is located south (upstream) of the medieval bridge. The Bangor-on-Dee bridge was reduced to only one-way traffic from the west, when the A525 by-pass opened. One of the bridge's parapets were destroyed by a tractor in 1996, with repairs later carried out, as well as a wider restoration works since the 1990s.

References

{{Wrexham, state=collapsed Bridges across the River Dee, Wales Road bridges in Wales Bridges in Wrexham County Borough Grade I listed bridges in Wales Grade I listed buildings in Wrexham County Borough

Description

History

See also

References