IMAGES TAKEN NEAR TO
Bonhill View, ALEXANDRIA, G83 0SZ

From along Bridge Street, beside the station.

The current bridge dates from 1986, and replaced an earlier bridge (built in 1898). It carries Bridge Street over the River Leven.

The original Bonhill Bridge (Bawbee Bridge) was built in 1836. It was a chain suspension bridge and was nicknamed "Bawbee Bridge" due to the charge made for a person to cross it. The second Bonhill Bridge was opened in 1898 and was nicknamed "Whipple Arch". It had a span of 50m and a width of 11.5m. The steel bridge was supported on four red sandstone abutments and carried the usual utilities as well as the tramlines for this new form of transport in the area. The third Bonhill Bridge was nicknamed “Rainbow Bridge” and the first car drove over it on 28 July 1987. It is made of 284 tonnes of steel, with a span of 60m and width of 14.5m.

The New Bridge built 1986 which replaced the Black Bridge built in 1898, replacing a suspension bridge of 1836 built by Admiral Smollett.

The picture, showing cleaning, painting and maintenance work on the bridge, was taken from the footpath / cycle route. For a view from across the river, see Image For views of the bridge shortly after this work was completed, see Image and Image For more on the bridge, see Image

The same activity is shown, from the other side of the river, in Image See also Image

The bridge, as it appears here, had recently been cleaned and painted (Image / Image). When this picture was taken, spikes had been added to the upper parts of the two main arches, to deter pigeons, but none had, as yet, been added to the cross-spars, so the birds were sitting there. See Image (Spikes were added to the cross-spars in late April 2013.)

This is a view from the Bonhill end of the bridge. See Image for a view from the other end. Click on http://www.geograph.org.uk/tagged/Bonhill+Bridge#photo=3250493 for related pictures.

There are three of these small pyramids standing here in a car-parking area at the riverside, next to Bonhill Bridge; of these, only the one shown in this image bears a plaque (by 2015, the plaque had gone). Its text reads: "Bonhill Bridge erected by the County Council of Dunbarton was opened for traffic on 2nd July 1898. Convener of the County The Rt. Honble. Lord Overtoun. Chairman of the Road Board John Gilmour Esqr." Note that the plaque does not describe the existing (as of 2009) bridge (see Image), but, rather, its immediate predecessor. The white building visible through the trees, in the background, was (when this picture was taken) used by a dental practice.

Old warning sign for cables on the eastern bank of the River Leven at Bonhill.