The Chappel Viaduct is a railway viaduct that crosses the River Colne in the

Colne Valley The Colne Valley is a steep sided valley on the east flank of the Pennine Hills in the English county of West Yorkshire. It takes its name from the River Colne which rises above the town of Marsden and flows eastward towards Huddersfield. ...

Essex Essex () is a county in the East of England. One of the home counties, it borders Suffolk and Cambridgeshire to the north, the North Sea to the east, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent across the estuary of the River Thames to the south, and Grea ...

, England. It carries the

Gainsborough Line The Gainsborough line is the current marketing name of the Sudbury branch line, a railway branch line off the Great Eastern Main Line in the east of England, that links in Essex with in Suffolk. It is in length and single-track throughou ...

which now is a short branch linking in Essex to in Suffolk. The line previously, however, extended to Shelford in

Cambridgeshire Cambridgeshire (abbreviated Cambs.) is a county in the East of England, bordering Lincolnshire to the north, Norfolk to the north-east, Suffolk to the east, Essex and Hertfordshire to the south, and Bedfordshire and Northamptonshire to the ...

. It was completed in 1849 by the

Eastern Union Railway The Eastern Union Railway (EUR) was an English railway company, at first built from Colchester to Ipswich; it opened in 1846. It was proposed when the earlier Eastern Counties Railway failed to make its promised line from Colchester to Norwich. T ...

, which was later absorbed into the Great Eastern Railway. It is the longest bridge in the East Anglia region at , and one of the largest brick-built structures in the country. It was

listed Listed may refer to: * Listed, Bornholm, a fishing village on the Danish island of Bornholm * Listed (MMM program), a television show on MuchMoreMusic * Endangered species in biology * Listed building, in architecture, designation of a historicall ...

at Grade II in 1967.

Description

The viaduct consists of 32 semi-circular spans, with tapered piers; it is long and rises to a maximum height of . The

pier Seaside pleasure pier in Brighton, England. The first seaside piers were built in England in the early 19th century.">England.html" ;"title="Brighton, England">Brighton, England. The first seaside piers were built in England in the early 19th ...

s consist of two shafts, separated by a opening, joined at the top and bottom by arches. Each shaft contains a hollow void up to by , partially filled with concrete to the level of the bottom arch. The running level of the viaduct has a

gradient In vector calculus, the gradient of a scalar-valued differentiable function of several variables is the vector field (or vector-valued function) \nabla f whose value at a point p is the "direction and rate of fastest increase". If the gr ...

of 1 in 120.

Construction

The seven million bricks used in the construction of the viaduct were made from clay excavated from the nearby village of Bures. It was built to carry a double-track railway but only a single track was laid. The bridge was built by Peter Bruff between 1847 and 1849 for the Colchester, Stour Valley, Sudbury & Halstead Railway, later part of the Great Eastern Railway. The railway initially planned to build the viaduct with laminated timber but Bruff opted for brick to reduce the cost. He debated the cost benefits of brick compared to timber with the Great Western Railway's chief engineer

Isambard Kingdom Brunel Isambard Kingdom Brunel (; 9 April 1806 – 15 September 1859) was a British civil engineer who is considered "one of the most ingenious and prolific figures in engineering history," "one of the 19th-century engineering giants," and "on ...

after a lecture at the

Institution of Civil Engineers The Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) is an independent professional association for civil engineers and a charitable body in the United Kingdom. Based in London, ICE has over 92,000 members, of whom three-quarters are located in the UK, whi ...

in 1850, Brunel being strongly in favour of using timber. Bruff went on to commission a painting of the viaduct by Frederick Brett Russell, which is now held by

Ipswich Museum Ipswich Museum is a registered museum of culture, history and natural heritage located on High Street in Ipswich, the county town of Suffolk. It was historically the leading regional museum in Suffolk, housing collections drawn from both the fo ...

. Sources differ on the cost of construction; E. A. Labrum gives the cost as £21,000, while

Historic England Historic England (officially the Historic Buildings and Monuments Commission for England) is an executive non-departmental public body of the British Government sponsored by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. It is tasked w ...

state a figure of £32,000 (both 1849). A foundation stone in pier 21 was laid by the railway company's chairman and deputy chairman at the start of works in September 1847 and newly minted coins were placed inside as a souvenir. The stone and coins disappeared within a few hours of being placed and a bricklayer was later arrested, having tried to pay at a bar with a new

half sovereign The half sovereign is a British gold coin with a nominal value of half of one pound sterling. It is half the weight (and has half the gold content) of its counterpart 'full' sovereign coin. The half sovereign was first introduced in 1544 under He ...

, but was not convicted of the theft due to lack of evidence.

Listing

The viaduct was designated a Grade II

listed structure In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

on 27 November 1967. It is the longest bridge in East Anglia, and was reported to have been built out of 7 million bricks, making it the third-largest brick-built structure in England after the

Battersea Power Station Battersea Power Station is a decommissioned Grade II* listed coal-fired power station, located on the south bank of the River Thames, in Nine Elms, Battersea, in the London Borough of Wandsworth. It was built by the London Power Company (LPC) ...

in London, although

Stockport Viaduct Stockport Viaduct carries the West Coast Main Line across the valley of the River Mersey in Stockport, Greater Manchester, England (). It is one of the largest brick structures in the United Kingdom and a major structure of the early railway age ...

and

Ouse Valley Viaduct The Ouse Valley Viaduct (or the Balcombe Viaduct) carries the London-Brighton Railway Line over the River Ouse in Sussex. It is located to the north of Haywards Heath and the south of Balcombe. Known for its ornate design, the structure ha ...

used approximately 11 million bricks each.

References

External links

{{Commons category-inline Bridges completed in 1849 Railway viaducts in Essex Grade II listed buildings in Essex Great Eastern Railway Grade II listed bridges

Description

Construction

Listing

See also

References

External links