The Forth Road Bridge

We are getting a new bridge. Hurrah! The old one is reaching the end of its life, and so a shiny new one is opening next year. I believe there are a lot of people who don't know much about the bridges across the Forth, so I thought I'd give you a little teach-in.

This one is the famous one. It's the Forth RAIL Bridge. It's the one that people refer to when they say that a project is "like painting the Forth Bridge", meaning that as soon as you've finished, you have to start again. Except in recent years, they've painted the whole thing using a very durable paint, and now they won't have to start again for forty years. I wonder if the expression will be as durable as the new paint, even though it's now not technically correct. I imagine so, as it's such a useful expression, and I can't think of one with a similar meaning that would do instead.

The Forth Rail Bridge was opened in 1890, and is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It wasn't designed by Brunel, though I expect a lot of people think it was (including me, probably, before I started writing this blog post). It has that 19th century big metal engineering structure look about it. Looking at it makes me want to use the word "cantilever", though I have no idea at all what one is.

This is the existing Forth ROAD Bridge, which doesn't have the majestic stature of the rail bridge (I'm trying to avoid the use of the word "iconic" here), but I do think it has a certain chunky dignity. When the new one is open, the old one will stay, for use by buses, taxis, cyclists and pedestrians.




Here is what the new Forth Road Bridge is going to look like. I like its svelte elegance.

There was a competition in 2012/13 to name the new bridge. Anyone could send in a suggestion, and then there was a vote on the top five. I was going to send in the suggestion "The Third Forth Bridge" (geddit?), and didn't, because I assumed a load of other people would, and then I would just be able to vote for it. But I was wrong in my assumption. I happened to cross the new Severn bridge in the summer of 2013, and I was delighted to see that it's called "The Second Severn Crossing". Well done, the Welsh. That's my kind of humour.

So not enough people suggested "The Third Forth Bridge" to get it into the top five, but apparently there was a popular suggestion to call the bridge "Kevin". There's a Scottish comedian called Kevin Bridges, which may help you to understand this seemingly odd idea. Though there is a blogger who calls her book club Kevin, so I guess you can call anything Kevin if you want to.

In fact, the five names that were shortlisted were rather unimaginative. They were:

• Caledonia Crossing
• Firth of Forth Crossing
• Queensferry Crossing
• Saltire Crossing
• St Margaret's Crossing. 

Over 35,000 people voted (not including me - I thought the suggestions were too boring), and the name "Queensferry Crossing" was the winner.

A lot of English people think that the bridges are a crossing between England and Scotland. They're not. The Firth of Forth is to the north side of Edinburgh, so if that were the case, Edinburgh would be in England. Which it isn't. The border between England and Scotland is a landmark that is much less conspicuous. In fact, it isn't a landmark at all. It's a sign on the A1, with a small layby. It would be nice to have a fancy bridge as the border, wouldn't it? It would make arriving in one country from the other feel a bit more special. I suppose we'll either have to move the border up to the Firth of Forth and then either relocate Edinburgh in its entirety, or let Edinburgh be in England. Alternatively, we could dig a huge channel across the Scottish Borders, and then build a bridge over it. The easiest solution, actually, would be to move the border a bit. It follows the River Tweed for miles and miles, and then just as it gets towards Britain's eastern edge, it jinks north and hits the coast about eight miles north of Berwick-upon-Tweed. This is somewhat perverse and rather a shame, because otherwise, these splendid bridges (road and rail) could be a rather satisfying border crossing.

And that little detour to Berwick-upon-Tweed,  my friends, concludes my lesson on the Forth Bridges.

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