Bridge No 6,

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Single-span stone and brick road over former rail bridge, erected c.1840. Set on an east/west axis carrying Mountjoy Avenue over the now disused GNR Branch line Portadown to Derry.

Single elliptical-headed arch formed in five courses of brick headers to a tooled impost stone, and rendered soffit. Random coursed rock-faced stone ashlar spandrels, piers and parapet. Tapering piers to either end of both elevations with tooled blocking course to base of parapet, with both parapet and piers surmounted by rock-faced stone coping.

Walling Rock-faced stone ashlar and brick

Historical information

The bridge first appears on the second edition map of 1852 carrying a road over a railway captioned ‘Londonderry & Enniskillen Railway’. By the third edition of 1905-6 this has become the ‘Great Northern Railway (Ireland)’.

McCutcheon comments on the development of the railway, "The Londonderry & Enniskillen Railway Company was incorporated in 1845, authorised to construct a single-track line of railway extending southwards from a Londonderry terminus…Work began soon afterwards and by April 1847 the single-track line had reached Strabane…The cost of construction was relatively low, about £10,000 per mile…However, due to the shortness of the line, storm damage…and competition from the Strabane Canal and Foyle Navigation, this first section of the company’s line was not a great commercial success. It was not until the construction of the line to Omagh, reached in 1852, Fintona (1853) and Enniskillen (1854) that the full benefits of the railway became apparent. Undoubtedly the new line of rail communication brought important commercial advantages to the towns which it served, and indirectly, to the agricultural lands, both arable and pastoral in character, lying along the valleys of the Foyle, its headstreams and tributaries, and to the flanking upland areas to both east and west. Omagh and Strabane, in particular, emerged as major market centres from which goods could be conveyed northwards to the port of Londonderry. ” (p.109-110)

The Londonderry and Enniskillen Railway eventually amalgamated with other lines, starting in 1860 when it was “leased to the Dundalk & Enniskillen Railway Company, subsequently the Irish North Western Railway Company, for 99 years …The INWR was absorbed by the Northern Railway Company on 1 January 1876 and this in turn merged with the Ulster Railway Company on 1 April 1876 to form the Great Northern Railway Company (Ireland).” (p.110-1)

During the post-war period the railways faced increasing competition from road transport and in 1953 the GNR ceased to exist as a separate and independent company. “In that year the entire system was acquired jointly by the Governments of Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, and was subsequently operated by a Board consisting of representatives of the two governments. In 1958 the greatly diminished portion of the former Great Northern system which lay within Northern Ireland passed under the absolute control of the Ulster Transport Authority” A period of contraction followed in which many lines deemed to be unremunerative were closed down. (p.119)

References:

Primary Sources

PRONI OS/6/6/25/1 – First Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1833)
PRONI OS/6/6/25/2 – Second Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1854)
PRONI OS/6/6/25/3 – Third Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1905)
PRONI OS/6/6/25/4 – Fourth Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1936-7)

Secondary Sources

McCutcheon, W.A. “The Industrial Archaeology of Northern Ireland,” London: HMSO, 1980.

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
D. Plan Form
F. Structural System

Criteria for listing: historic interest

X. Local Interest

Evaluation

This modestly sized bridge exhibits good quality stone masonry enlivened by the unusual brick voussoirs and gentle elliptical arch. While no longer crossing the railway, the bridge is still in use and remains an attractive element in the landscape in addition to its obvious industrial importance. It is one of a series of bridges that remain as a significant remnant of the route and part of the industrial heritage of the district.