The Nene Viaduct is a railway bridge immediately south of

Peterborough railway station Peterborough railway station serves the cathedral city of Peterborough, Cambridgeshire, England. It is sited north of . The station is a major interchange serving both the north–south East Coast Main Line, as well as long-distance and loca ...

Cambridgeshire Cambridgeshire (abbreviated Cambs.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the East of England and East Anglia. It is bordered by Lincolnshire to the north, Norfolk to the north-east, Suffolk to the east, Essex and Hertfor ...

, Eastern England. It was built to carry the Great Northern Railway across the

River Nene The River Nene ( or ) flows through the counties of Northamptonshire, Cambridgeshire, Lincolnshire, and Norfolk in Eastern England from its sources in Arbury Hill in Northamptonshire. Flowing Northeast through East England to its mouth at Lutt ...

. It is a Grade II*

listed building 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 ...

History and design

The Nene Viaduct was built in 1850 by father and son Sir William Cubitt and Joseph Cubitt for the Great Northern Railway to carry their main line across the

just south of Peterborough. It is bridge number 184 on what is today the

East Coast Main Line The East Coast Main Line (ECML) is a electrified railway between its northern terminus at and southern terminus at . The key towns and cities of , , , , and are on the line. The line is a key transport artery on the eastern side of Grea ...

. The viaduct was constructed using

cast iron Cast iron is a class of iron–carbon alloys with a carbon content of more than 2% and silicon content around 1–3%. Its usefulness derives from its relatively low melting temperature. The alloying elements determine the form in which its car ...

and consists of six

ribs The rib cage or thoracic cage is an endoskeletal enclosure in the thorax of most vertebrates that comprises the ribs, vertebral column and sternum, which protect the vital organs of the thoracic cavity, such as the heart, lungs and great vessels ...

bolted together to form two segments, spanning the River Nene in three

arches An arch is a curved vertical structure span (engineering), 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 mill ...

. It is supported by two piers in the water, which each consist of three pairs of fluted columns; these rest on caissons that are sunk into the river. Steel bracing beneath the arches forms a walkway and the

spandrel A spandrel is a roughly triangular space, usually found in pairs, between the top of an arch and a rectangular frame, between the tops of two adjacent arches, or one of the four spaces between a circle within a square. They are frequently fil ...

s contain diamond-shaped

latticework __NOTOC__ Latticework is an openwork framework consisting of a criss-crossed pattern of strips of building material, typically wood or metal. The design is created by crossing the strips to form a grid or weave. Latticework may be functional &nd ...

. At the top is a decorative balustrade, also of cast iron. The

abutment An abutment is the substructure at the ends of a bridge span or dam supporting its superstructure. Single-span bridges have abutments at each end that provide vertical and lateral support for the span, as well as acting as retaining walls ...

s are of brick construction, twelve arches on the south bank and three on the north. The bridge has a plaque that claims that the Nene Viaduct is the last surviving cast-iron structure on a main railway line in Britain. The plaque originally attributed the bridge incorrectly to

Lewis Cubitt Lewis Cubitt (29 September 1799 – 9 June 1883) was an English civil engineer and architect. Life He was a younger brother of Thomas Cubitt, the leading master builder in London in the second quarter of the 19th century, and he designed many ...

, but this has now been amended to Joseph Cubitt. :File:Peterborough 1850 iron bridge.jpg<--> The bridge has been strengthened several times through its history, including with steel ties in 1910 and additional work in 1914, but continues to carry high-speed trains today. The railway line was quadrupled in 1924, at which time a second bridge was constructed alongside the Nene Viaduct. The second is a

steel Steel is an alloy of iron and carbon that demonstrates improved mechanical properties compared to the pure form of iron. Due to steel's high Young's modulus, elastic modulus, Yield (engineering), yield strength, Fracture, fracture strength a ...

truss bridge A truss bridge is a bridge whose load-bearing superstructure is composed of a truss, a structure of connected elements, usually forming triangular units. The connected elements, typically straight, may be stressed from tension, compression, or ...

and is not considered by

Historic England Historic England (officially the Historic Buildings and Monuments Commission for England) is an executive non-departmental public body of the British Government sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. It is tasked with prot ...

to be of special interest.

References

{{Reflist Grade II* listed railway bridges and viaducts Grade II* listed buildings in Cambridgeshire Railway viaducts in Cambridgeshire Bridges across the River Nene Buildings and structures in Peterborough East Coast Main Line

History and design

See also

References