Existing Lifting Bridge
The existing Poole lifting bridge was built in 1926. At the time, it was regarded as a state-of-the-art engineering solution to the challenge of providing a road link across a busy shipping channel.
Some interesting facts about the Poole lifting bridge:
- The existing lifting bridge was built in 1927 and is the third to be located on the site.
It has 7 time-tabled lifts a day and another 10 unscheduled lifts for commercial boats. - It has provided an estimated 400,000 lifts since it first opened in 1927.
- Some of the rules for the bridge date back to William IV's reign.
- The most road traffic recorded over the bridge was 22,000 vehicles a day, in 1988. The Holes Bay Road has taken some traffic off, and typical flows are now 20,000 vehicles a day.
- Boat traffic is very seasonal - in winter there may be less than 10 boats a day, on peak summer weekends, over 300.
- The average lift is 6 minutes, but on peak summer weekends the bridge may be up for 35 minutes.
- The bridge is a public highway, free to users. However bridges that stood there before 1927 were privately owned toll bridges.
- The two halves of the deck weigh 180 tonnes each - but they are so well balanced that they can be lifted by hand.
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