The earliest bridge across the Tyne, Pons Aelius, was built by the Romans on the site of the present Swing Bridge around 122. A series of wooden bridges were lost to fire or flood, and plans for a stone bridge were begun in about 1250 with support from local landowners, and the Bishops of Durham, York and Caithness. The stone bridge was constructed but then destroyed by flood in 1339. Repairs proved costly and took place in sections: it was not fully repaired, as a part stone and part wooden bridge, until the 16th century. A new stone bridge was begun in the 1770s after the city council petitioned Parliament. The foundation stone on the north side was laid by Sir Matthew White Ridley on April 25, 1775 with the south side foundation stone laid in 1776. Works were completed by September 13, 1779 at an estimated cost of between £30,000 and £60,000. Work on a modern bridge started in August 1925 with Dorman Long acting as the building contractors. Despite the dangers of the building work, only one worker, Nathaniel Collins, a father of four and a local scaffolder from South Shields, died in the building of this structure. The Tyne Bridge was designed by Mott, Hay and Anderson, comparable to their Sydney Harbour Bridge version. These bridges derived their design from the Hell Gate Bridge in New York City. The Dorman Long team was also notable for including Dorothy Buchanan, the first female member of the Institution of Civil Engineers, joining in 1927; in addition to her contribution to the Tyne Bridge, she served as part of the team for the Sydney Harbour Bridge and the Lambeth Bridge in London. The bridge was completed on 25 February 1928, and officially opened on 10 October by King George V and Queen Mary, who were the first to use the roadway, travelling in their Ascot Landau. The opening ceremony was attended by 20,000 schoolchildren who had been given the day off. Movietone news recorded the speech given by the King. The Tyne Bridge's towers were built of Cornish granite and were designed by local architect Robert Burns Dick as warehouses with five storeys. But, the inner floors of the warehouses in the bridge's towers were not completed and, as a result, the storage areas were never used. Lifts for passengers and goods were built in the towers to provide access to the Quayside; they are no longer in use. The bridge's design uses a parabolic arch. The bridge was originally painted green with special paint made by J. Dampney Co. of Gateshead. The same colours were used to paint the bridge in 2000.
Technical Information
Total length
Length of arch span
Rise of arch
Clearance
Height
Width
Structural Steel
Total number of rivets
777,124
History of operations
In 2012 the largest Olympic rings in the UK were erected on the bridge. The rings were manufactured by commercial signage specialists Signmaster ED Ltd of Kelso. The rings were over and weighed in excess of four tonnes. This was in preparation for Newcastle hosting the Olympic football tournament, and the Olympic torch relay, in which Bear Grylls zipwired from the top of the arch, to Gateshead quayside. On 28 June 2012, a large lightning bolt struck the Tyne Bridge. It lit up the roads as the sky was very dark. The bolt, part of a super-cell thunderstorm, came with heavy rain – a month's worth of rainfall in just two hours – causing flash flooding on Tyneside. In 2015 Newcastle upon Tyne was a host city for the Rugby World Cup. Three matches were played at St James's Park, the home of Newcastle United Football Club. In recognition, a large illuminated sign was erected on Tyne Bridge. On 13 November 2017, the Tyne Bridge was the venue for the Freedom on the Tyne finale, the finale of the 2017 Freedom City festival. The 2017 Freedom City festival commemorated Newcastle's civil rights history and the 50 years since Dr Martin Luther King's visit to Newcastle, where King received his honorary degree from Newcastle University. Newcastle University and Freedom City 2017 wanted to use the Tyne Bridge to symbolically hark back in history to Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama where King was involved in one of the key moments for the struggle for civil rights in 1965. 24 roads around the Tyne Bridge where closed for the day long event. The Freedom of the Tyne event featured the many civil right stories from history. The final event, revolved around the Jarrow Crusade which was described as a memorable closing to the finale.
Grade II* listed by Historic England
On the 23 August 2018 the bridge became one of the 0.01% of structures in England which are Grade II* listed. The rating means the bridge is a particular important structure of more than special interest. The bridge was upgraded by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport on the advice of Historic England. The bridge was upgraded to Grade II* for architectural and historical interest, as outlined here:
Kittiwake colony
The bridge and nearby structures are used as a nesting site by a colony of around 700 pairs of black-legged kittiwakes, the furthest inland in the world. The colony featured in the BBC's Springwatch programme in 2010. Several groups, including the Natural History Society of Northumbria and local Wildlife Trusts, formed a "Tyne Kittiwake Partnership" to safeguard the colony. A proposal for a tower to be built as an alternative nesting site was made in 2011, and in November 2015 a neighbouring hotel submitted a planning application for measures to discourage the birds.
