Pont y Cafnau iron rail bridge and aqueduct (1793)

Image: © John Wilson Taken: 9 Mar 2007

A note on viewing the bridge design: 1) Double deck | This is a cast iron bridge, with a double deck - the upper deck for the rail tram-road, and the lower deck for the aqueduct. 2) Cast iron A frame structure | The wire mesh and rails have been added to the bridge at a later date, confusing the appearance to the eye of the original design elements. - The original structure is the cast iron A frame - hence this was a bold, functional and elegant design with a certain aesthetic integrity. The Pont y Cafnau iron bridge has been acknowledged as the world's oldest surviving iron railway bridge [ - see Context for World Heritage Bridges A joint publication with TICCIH, 1996, By Eric DeLony http://www.icomos.org/studies/bridges.htm ; and Hague, D and Hughes, S - Pont Y Cafnau, the first iron railway bridge and aqueduct? - Ass. Industrial Archaeology Bulletin, 1982, 9, No4, 3-4 ]. The Pont y Cafnau bridge is located just below the confluence of the Afon Taf Fawr and the Afon Taf Fechan rivers; it is used as a public footpath and may be used to cross the river and connect the Taff Trail waymarked path with the nearby Cyfarthfa Castle. This is a unique cast-iron bridge, a two-deck combined aqueduct and tramroad bridge built by the chief engineer of the Cyfarthfa ironworks, to carry both the works' tram line from the nearby limestone quarries at Gurnos and its water supply over the river. Its diminutive scale notwithstanding, this was an important early prototype for iron bridge construction that influenced Telford's monumental feats of engineering such as the celebrated Pontcysyllte and Chirk aqueducts. [ See The International Canal Monuments List, and: http://www.icomos.org/studies/canals2a.htm ]

Images are licensed for reuse under creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0