4 Stoneferry 1905

Stoneferry swing bridge was built by the Motherwell Bridge Company and opened in 1905 to replace the existing ferry. Lots of us can remember driving over this wonderful old swing bridge before it was replaced by the two Shadoof-type lifting bascule bridges in 1991.

The plans show the original opening and hand gears along with the general layout of the bridge as it was built in 1905.

In the first gallery below, the photographs show the bridge swinging for the tanker barge Burdale H, built at John Harkers in Knottingley in 1957. The barge was bought by J R Rix in 1976 and renamed the Rix Kestrel in 1993. The second includes the view from a barge approaching from the north, and the control tower of the new bridge taking shape dates those photographs to the late 1980s.

The two maps below are used with the permission of the National Library of Scotland and show Stoneferry before the bridge from 1892 and with the bridge from 1910.

Click on each plan and zoom in to see the detail.

The photograph, on the left above, from Britain from Above shows the Premier Oil Extracting Mills, Stoneferry Swing Bridge and the River Hull, Kingston upon Hull, in 1931 and the photograph on the right is captioned Premier Oil Extracting Mills, Kingston upon Hull, 1932.

The photograph above – and the map below – show the ferry before the bridge, from an original glass plate I’ve restored taken circa 1900 and the map from 1892.

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