Croeserw Viaduct

Cadw's description

Location

Spanning the Afan river approximately 200m E of the centre of Cymmer.

History

Built by the Rhondda & Swansea Bay Railway, which was incorporated in 1882 and was established to attract coal from the Rhondda Fawr collieries to the newly opened Prince of Wales Dock in Swansea. Croeserw Viaduct opened in 1890, although the line was not fully opened until 1900. The viaduct and the nearby Gelli Tunnel both suffered from mining subsidence and was the first section of the line to close. The viaduct was closed in 1959. It is now a footpath.

Exterior

A 7-bay viaduct of snecked, rock-faced stone and with round-headed brick arches on tapering piers. Two unequally placed shallow buttresses rise to the full height of the parapet where they define refuges. The parapet rises above a string course and has rock-faced copings (the copings and other parapet stonework are now partly missing). The parapets terminate in square piers.

Reason for designation

Listed as a good example of large-scale C19 railway engineering, representing a period when port and railway companies competed for lucrative business with South Wales colliery companies, resulting in cross-valley lines requiring extensive civil engineering.