trafficscotland.org/news/story.aspx?id=13212
One side has been closed for last couple of days as they discovered a problem with some steel beams. Now closing both sides for next 24 hours initially.
Of all the fly on the wall real-life tv program docu type things, I would love to see what the team do to resolve this. According to one report this morning, they had a team of engineers working throughout the night on calculations of load bearings and structures to try and come up with a solution.
|
Update, going to be closed to the New Year!
Nightmare!!
|
Lucky that they found out before something happened.
Wasn't the new Severn bridge built because someone worked out that the old one would be at risk of failure in the event of a traffic jam of HGVs or is it an "old wives tale"?
|
>> Lucky that they found out before something happened.
>>
>> Wasn't the new Severn bridge built because someone worked out that the old one would
>> be at risk of failure in the event of a traffic jam of HGVs or
>> is it an "old wives tale"?
>>
More likely it was built because the tailbacks on the old one were becoming ridiculous.
Out of interest; has the Forth railway bridge ever been closed due to structural problems or faults?
|
>>has the Forth railway bridge ever been closed due to structural problems or faults
To my knowledge the Forth Bridge has never been closed due to these issues - while it's metalwork was being heavily renovated (old paint slag-blasted and painted with a 3-layer epoxy finish) after 2002 it may have had brief closures to facilitate renovations and in the 90s when the rails were replaced.
Apparently its service life is currently estimated to be "over 100 years". I expect it was massively over-engineered after the failure of the Tay Bridge.
It really is an impressive piece of kit!
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forth_Bridge#World_Heritage_Site_status
Last edited by: Lygonos on Fri 4 Dec 15 at 14:34
|
This makes me feel quite old. I can just about remember as a pre-school child crossing the Forth on the car ferry in my dad's Zephyr before the road bridge was built ( or completed anyway )
There's an embarrassing photo somewhere with me on that ferry aged about 3 or so in a Frank Spencer type beige mac and a black beret. I must get around to destroying that.
|
|
Snap. Not only remember the ferry but going several times to sit in the car at a vantage point and watch the bridge being built. I recall there was what we would now call an urban legend that a drunk sailor walked the length of the cables from one side to the other before the road deck was laid.
|
Edinburgh childhood Martin?
Later, long after it was built and we were older, I can remember cycling down to the bridge and over it on the combined footpath/cycle way. We sometimes stopped halfway and climbed over the handrail to dangle in mid air off the bridge for a dare or possibly even more stupidly, sort of tightrope walk the handrail. Fall to one side onto the path, fall to the other and there would have been an eventual splash.
Makes me shiver now but at the time and in the mindset of an idiotic 12 year old it seemed like a good idea...
|
|
Yes, Edinburgh childhood until Uni, then Aberdeen before moving to England in my late twenties. Seems from this thread we have the makings of a Caledonian Society right here.
|
|
As tenuous coincidences go, this is fairly out there, but the father of one of my childhood friends and neighbours in Edinburgh had a burgundy coloured DB6. I know you're not him by the simple and sad expedient of knowing the chap in question is no longer with us, but I suppose I wonder if you ever remember seeing the car? There weren't too many Aston Martins around in Edinburgh back then!
|
|
Sorry no. However my uncle is a Edinburgh based car buff (used to race for Chatham Honda for example) and I will ask him if it rings any bells when I am up at Christmas. My motoring related Edinburgh memories are watching racing at Ingliston and the joys of driving a rear engined Renault on wet cobbles.
|
|
Yes, when my parents lived near Dunfermline and I lived in London I used the ferry, and also remember the road bridge being built. Made a great difference in journey time but it was a loss somehow.
|
>> Yes, when my parents lived near Dunfermline...
Rosyth?
|
Place called Crombie, sort of admiralty barrack disguised as a village, with my dad's posh but bleak house and one other, I seem to remember Humph.
Used to get plastered in the police canteen I remember, somewhat less distinctly though. The fuzz seemed indulgent.
|
>>Place called Crombie, sort of admiralty barrack disguised as a village
Last time I passed Crombie I noticed the "Social Club" was no more.
It is not that long ago that Social Clubs, Railway Club, BP Club, ICI Club, Naval Club, British Legion etc all seem to be closing their doors - around my part of the woods at any rate. Always a reasonable pint @ a bargain price.
|
>> Last time I passed Crombie I noticed the "Social Club" was no more.
Sorry to hear that. But all things pass.
We lived in Crombie, grace and favour gaff sort of. You're right: Rosyth was a focus of my old man's attention. And other places in the Forth estuary whose names I forget.
I was irresposible at the time and pretty stoned. Fitted in fairly well with the local matelots though, slightly to my surprise. Very vaguely remember an uproarious evening when my Notting Hill friend Beckett came to stay for the weekend. He loved my mother's spaghetti sauce.
|
>> Very vaguely remember an uproarious evening when my Notting Hill friend Beckett came to stay for the weekend.
In the police canteen of course, with a mixed clientele of sailors, admiralty fuzz and us.
|
>> It is not that long ago that Social Clubs, Railway Club, BP Club, ICI Club,
>> Naval Club, British Legion etc all seem to be closing their doors -
Dirty, unkempt smelly scruffy places, Always full of old men whining about the good old days, how bad their employer is, the women sitting around on sagging sofas with holes in. Badly kept beer, warm rola cola (non of this proper branded stuff - no ice of course) The food is crap, The snooker table has a tilt, the cloth is grey with age and the cushions have no bounce,
Hateful places.
They dont even have the only good bit, the old style female pub singer, any more.
|
>> Dirty, unkempt smelly scruffy places, Always full of old men whining about the good old days,
>> Hateful places.
The Crombie police canteen wasn't like that. No old men and no non-military women (if any at all). Nor did I notice anything wrong with the beer. I was even less of a connoisseur then than I am now, but the coppers and matelots seemed to lap it up.
|
|
Can't remember eating anything there, but being called a canteen it must have had food. Sausage egg and chips sort of thing probably. I always liked that sort of thing when on the road, but I could be fed for nothing at home leaving more money for beer.
|
...have the 'Spoons police been at this thread, or am I suffering from AC syndrome?
|
>> am I suffering from AC syndrome?
Judging by your handle, I'd say yes.
|
Any of you who are on twitter, Forth Road Bridge are updating via tweets with the works and some pictures.
Posted a fascinating photo today showing the bridge with no weight on it, and also with 156 tonnes on it (they positioned a row of gritters on the bridge so knew the weight)
The different shape that the supports took on with the weight on the bridge was quite amazing!
|
Wow, that's serious flattening.
Don't see any heavy trucks though. I reckon its just Westpig and a couple of his rotund colleagues stringing those awful striped tapes all over the place and generally giving the citizen the finger so to speak.
|
>> Wow, that's serious flattening.
>>
During 100mph winds the centre of the FRB deflects about 20' sideways. There is a photo of it somewhere which I can't find at the moment.
|
It'll take one hell of a storm to blow the bridge over.
Traffic on the other hand...
www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbhOUl9ppy4
|
>> Posted a fascinating photo today showing the bridge with no weight on it, and also
>> with 156 tonnes on it (they positioned a row of gritters on the bridge so
>> knew the weight)
>> The different shape that the supports took on with the weight on the bridge was
>> quite amazing!
>>
Says 518T (tons/tonnes?) on the photo.
|
>> Says 518T (tons/tonnes?) on the photo.
>>
I think those photos are a single heavy load crossing the bridge some time ago. It is sometimes closed for heavy or wide loads to cross. The photos are taken looking North and if it was recent you would see the North tower of the new bridge to the left of the road bridge.
Last edited by: Old Navy on Thu 31 Dec 15 at 19:20
|
Missed the edit -
Also you can't see the reinforcing plates added to the bridge towers some years ago.
|
Thanks for that - it says that the bridge is closed because "a crack was discovered in a truss under the carriageway."
They should never have made her Environment Secretary.
|
The new bridge (Queensferry crossing) is coming along, having been abroad for a couple of weeks and the old bridge being closed on our return we have seen a big change in the month since we last saw it.
www.fifetoday.co.uk/news/local-headlines/video-drone-footage-of-work-on-queensferry-crossing-1-3986957
|
>> Forth Road Bridge closure inquiry to begin at Holyrood
>>
>> www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-35354846
Enquiry? they will blame it not he English in general and the Tories in particular, and would never have happened under independence.
There just saved them several million quid, bet they are not grateful.
|
|
Many a true word, Z. The Edinburgh tram inquiry is running at two million quid and increasing.
|
>>Many a true word, Z. The Edinburgh tram inquiry is running at two million quid and increasing.
The new NHS call handling system is running £50m over the estimate of £78m and we learn today there are no clauses in the contract to enure the system is able to cope with the actual workload. Undoubtedly there needs to be an enquiry - so far the SG have invested in some carpet and a brush!
|
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-35492023
Full reopening of Forth Road Bridge delayed by month for HGVs
However, a phased re-introduction of lorries will begin at 23:00.
The trial will allow 600 HGVs to cross northbound between 23:00 and 04:00 each night,
subject to weather conditions.
It was thought the bridge would fully reopen in mid-February
but officials have now said it will be mid-March.
|
Forth Road Bridge closed for a couple of days - Bobby
