Road bridge

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Single-arch, pre 1830s rubble-built road bridge carrying Church Road over the River Bush. The bridge located on the south side of the village of Armoy, to the W of the Presbyterian church.

The bridge is constructed in random rubble and has a humped-back. The semicircular arch has roughly dressed voussoirs, some of which have been replaced with dressed sandstone on the E (upstream) face, and rough stone coping to the parapets. There are two buttresses to the right (N) side of the arch on the E face, and another to the right (S) side of the W face. Several tie rods have been inserted into the structure.

Historical information

A bridge along this stretch of road does not appear to be indicated on Taylor’s and Skinner’s map of 1777, but is indicated on John Lendrick’s map of 1780, and all others thereafter. In the view of industrial archaeologist Dr Fred Hamond, the bridge we see today is ‘probably 18th century’, suggesting, (in the light of the other evidence), that it could date from the late 1770s. The bridge is located on what was originally the Ballymena-Ballycastle road, and is described in the OS Memoirs of 1835 as ‘in good repair’.

The construction of a new stretch of road and a new bridge to the east sometime between 1832 and 1857, redirected traffic away from Armoy. Ironically, this probably contributed towards the survival of the older bridge.

References- Primary sources
1 Taylor, George, and Skinner, Andrew, ‘Taylor and Skinner’s Maps of the Roads of Ireland, surveyed 1777’ (Dublin, 1778), Map 20 etc.
2 Linen Hall Library, Belfast, ‘A Map of County Antrim…by J. Lendrick’ (1780)
3 PRONI OS/6/1/13/1 OS map, Co Antrim, sheet 13 (1832)
4 PRONI OS/6/1/13/2 OS map, Co Antrim, sheet 13 (1857)
5 PRONI OS/6/1/13/3 OS map, Co Antrim, sheet 13 (1906)

Other
references
1 EHS HB05/05/003 First Survey report (6 February 1973)
2 EHS HB05/05/003 Photographs (1973-84)

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
H-. Alterations detracting from building
J. Setting
K. Group value

Criteria for listing: historic interest

X. Local Interest

Evaluation

Single-arch, pre 1830s rubble-built road bridge carrying Church Road over the River Bush. A good example of a single-arch bridge which may date from the later 18th century, still largely intact.