A chain bridge is a historic form of

suspension bridge A suspension bridge is a type of bridge in which the deck is hung below suspension cables on vertical suspenders. The first modern examples of this type of bridge were built in the early 1800s. Simple suspension bridges, which lack vertical ...

for which chains or eyebars were used instead of wire ropes to carry the bridge deck. A famous example is the

Széchenyi Chain Bridge The Széchenyi Chain Bridge ( hu, Széchenyi lánchíd ) is a chain bridge that spans the River Danube between Buda and Pest, the western and eastern sides of Budapest, the capital of Hungary. Designed by English engineer William Tierney Clark a ...

in Budapest. Construction types are, as for other suspension bridges, a

stressed ribbon bridge A stressed ribbon bridge (also stress-ribbon bridge or catenary bridge) is a tension structure (similar in many ways to a simple suspension bridge). The suspension cables are embedded in the deck, which follows a catenary arc between supports. ...

, a true suspension bridge, and special forms, such as the

Tower Bridge Tower Bridge is a Grade I listed combined bascule and suspension bridge in London, built between 1886 and 1894, designed by Horace Jones and engineered by John Wolfe Barry with the help of Henry Marc Brunel. It crosses the River Thames close ...

and the Albert Bridge, London. Chain bridges were the first bridges able to cross wider spans than the previous wooden and stone bridges, combined with shorter building times and at lower costs.Robert Stevenson: ''Description of Bridges of Suspension.''
In: ''The Edinburgh Philosophical Journal'', ed. Sir David Brewster, Robert Jameson. vol. 5 no. 10, Edinburgh 1821, p. 237.

History

The first chain bridge in Europe was the , built around 1741 across the Tees in North-eastern England. It served mainly miners entering the nearby mine. It collapsed in 1802, and was replaced in 1830 by a suspension bridge with suspension chains. A chain bridge was built in the 1780s and 1790s in the Wörlitzer Park which crossed a canal between artificial rocks. The light construction was intended to move, to create sensual sensations for the visitors of the park. The Steinfurter Bagno park had a chain bridge from 1794. In 1820, Samuel Brown opened the Union Bridge over the

River Tweed The River Tweed, or Tweed Water ( gd, Abhainn Thuaidh, sco, Watter o Tweid, cy, Tuedd), is a river long that flows east across the Border region in Scotland and northern England. Tweed cloth derives its name from its association with the R ...

on the Scottish-English border, which was the first suspension bridge in Europe suitable for carts. It is the oldest such bridge still used for traffic. Claude Navier published the first fundamental paper about suspension bridges in 1823.Claude Navier: ''Rapport à Monsieur Becquey, conseiller d’état, directeur général des ponts et chaussées et des mines; et mémoire sur les ponts suspendus.''
Imprimerie Royale, Paris 1823 The first chain bridge on the European continent was opened in 1824, the Kettensteg in

Nuremberg Nuremberg ( ; german: link=no, Nürnberg ; in the local East Franconian dialect: ''Nämberch'' ) is the second-largest city of the German state of Bavaria after its capital Munich, and its 518,370 (2019) inhabitants make it the 14th-largest ...

. A little later, the crossing the

Donaukanal The Donaukanal ("Danube Canal") is a former arm of the river Danube, now regulated as a water channel (since 1598), within the city of Vienna, Austria. It is long and, unlike the Danube itself, it borders Vienna's city centre, Innere Stadt, ...

in Vienna was opened for pedestrians and carriages. To celebrate this event the Chain Bridge Waltz was written by Johann Strauss. In 1849, the

over the Danube in Budapest was opened, designed by

William Tierney Clark William Tierney Clark FRS FRAS (23 August 1783 – 22 September 1852) was an English civil engineer particularly associated with the design and construction of bridges. He was among the earliest designers of suspension bridges. Born in Br ...

, spanning 200 m. The Empress Elisabeth Bridge over the Elbe at Tetschen (today: Děčín) was completed in 1855, and the same year the

Nicholas Chain Bridge The Nicholas Chain Bridge (or Nikolaevsky Chain Bridge; uk, Миколаївський ланцюговий міст; russian: Николаевский цепной мост) was a chain bridge over the Dnieper that existed from 1855 to 1920 in ...

Kyiv Kyiv, also spelled Kiev, is the capital and most populous city of Ukraine. It is in north-central Ukraine along the Dnieper, Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2021, its population was 2,962,180, making Kyiv the List of European cities by populat ...

, which spanned the

Dnieper } The Dnieper () or Dnipro (); , ; . is one of the major transboundary rivers of Europe, rising in the Valdai Hills near Smolensk, Russia, before flowing through Belarus and Ukraine to the Black Sea. It is the longest river of Ukraine ...

in four segments of 143 m each. 11836-Bodenbach-1910-Blick über die Brücke nach Bodenbach-Brück & Sohn Kunstverlag.jpg, Empress Elisabeth Bridge, Tetschen Nicholas Chain Bridge LOC 03819.jpg,

Tower Bridge,London Getting Opened 2.jpg,

, London Erzsébet Bridge (1903), Budapest, Hungary.jpg, Elisabeth Bridge, Budapest The

in London was opened in 1884, a unique combination of suspension bridge and

drawbridge A drawbridge or draw-bridge is a type of moveable bridge typically at the entrance to a castle or tower surrounded by a moat. In some forms of English, including American English, the word ''drawbridge'' commonly refers to all types of moveable ...

, and the Elisabeth Bridge in Budapest was opened in 1903, marking the peak of chain bridge building. Later bridges of the type included the Kaiserbrücke in Breslau (today: Grunwaldbrücke in

Wrocław Wrocław (; , . german: Breslau, , also known by other names) is a city in southwestern Poland and the largest city in the historical region of Silesia. It lies on the banks of the Oder in the Silesian Lowlands of Central Europe, roughly ...

) of 1910, and the

Deutzer Hängebrücke The Deutz Suspension Bridge (german: Deutzer Hängebrücke) was a self-anchored suspension bridge using eyebar chains, located across the Rhine at Deutz in Cologne, Germany. It was built from 1913 to 1915. In 1935, it was named Hindenburg Bridge ...

, opened in 1915. The Three Sisters were three similar bridges in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, built from 1924 to 1928 over the

Allegheny River The Allegheny River ( ) is a long headwater stream of the Ohio River in western Pennsylvania and New York. The Allegheny River runs from its headwaters just below the middle of Pennsylvania's northern border northwesterly into New York then i ...

. The Hercilio Luz Bridge in Brazil of 1926 had the longest span of all chain bridges at 339,5 m. A similar bridge was built two years later, the Silver Bridge over the Ohio River. It collapsed in 1967. The last large chain bridges were the

Reichsbrücke The Reichsbrücke (German for ''Imperial Bridge'') is a major bridge in Vienna, linking Mexikoplatz in Leopoldstadt with the Donauinsel in Donaustadt across the Danube. The bridge is used by 50,000 vehicles per day and carries six lanes of traf ...

in Vienna (1937) and the Krymsky Bridge in Moscow (1938).

References

External links

* * Eric DeLony
Context for World Heritage Bridges
icomos.org 1996
Eyebar suspension
bridgehunter.com
Chain Bridges and Welsh Iron
engineering-timelines.com {{authority control