Where is Hownsgill Viaduct?

Hownsgill Viaduct is in North East England, in the United Kingdom — coordinates 54.8359°, -1.8522°.

Historic bridges · North East England

Hownsgill Viaduct

Hownsgill Viaduct in England North East, United Kingdom.

Plan your visit

Typical visit: 15 min–30 min

Hownsgill Viaduct is a place of interest in England North East, United Kingdom — drawn from open-data sources for visitor reference. See the linked Wikipedia article for the full description.

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From the Wikipedia article

The Hownsgill Viaduct (in some sources called Hownes Gill Viaduct and locally called the Gill bridge) is a former railway bridge located west of Consett in County Durham, England. It is currently used as a footpath and cycleway.

Excerpt from Wikipedia under CC BY-SA 4.0. See the source article linked in Sources below.

Background

History

From July 1832 to May 1834, Robert Stephenson was consulting engineer to the industrial Stanhope and Tyne Railway (S&TR), built to transport limestone from Stanhope to Consett, and then with coal onwards to Tyne Dock in South Shields. However, the company was unable to afford a bridge over the 49 m deep and 244 m wide dry valley, Hown's Gill. The company hence authorised Stephenson to construct two steep rope-worked inclines, one at 1:2.5 and a second at 1:3. To enable wagons to be transported from to and onwards to , single wagons were carried sideways in cradles worked by a single stationary steam engine located at the bottom of the gorge. After the S&TR sold its assets in 1842, while the…

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