The Sheppey Crossing is a

bridge A bridge is a structure built to span a physical obstacle (such as a body of water, valley, road, or rail) without blocking the way underneath. It is constructed for the purpose of providing passage over the obstacle, which is usually somethi ...

which carries the

A249 road The A249 is a road in Kent, England, running from Maidstone to Sheerness on the Isle of Sheppey. It mainly functions as a link between the M2 and M20 motorways, and for goods vehicle traffic to the port at Sheerness. In 2006 an upgraded du ...

across

The Swale The Swale is a tidal channel of the Thames estuary that separates the Isle of Sheppey from the rest of Kent. On its banks is a biological Site of Special Scientific Interest which stretches from Sittingbourne to Whitstable in Kent. It is also ...

tidal strait A tidal strait is technically not a river but a strait connecting two oceans or seas. Tidal straits are narrow seaways through which tidal currents flow. Tidal currents are usually unidirectional but sometimes are bidirectional. They are frequent ...

of the

Thames Estuary The Thames Estuary is where the River Thames meets the waters of the North Sea, in the south-east of Great Britain. Limits An estuary can be defined according to different criteria (e.g. tidal, geographical, navigational or in terms of salini ...

), linking the

Isle of Sheppey The Isle of Sheppey is an island off the northern coast of Kent, England, neighbouring the Thames Estuary, centred from central London. It has an area of . The island forms part of the local government district of Swale. ''Sheppey'' is derived ...

with the mainland of

Kent Kent is a county in South East England and one of the home counties. It borders Greater London to the north-west, Surrey to the west and East Sussex to the south-west, and Essex to the north across the estuary of the River Thames; it faces ...

. The four-lane crossing measures 21.5 m (71 feet) in width, at a height of 35 m (115 feet) over the water. The A249 links the M20 and M2 motorways to Sheppey. The bridge opened in 2006, and it provides an alternative highway to the neighbouring

Kingsferry Bridge The Kingsferry Bridge is a combined road and railway vertical-lift bridge which connects the Isle of Sheppey to mainland Kent in South East England. The seven-span bridge has a central lifting span which allows ships to pass. In 1860, the firs ...

that was completed in 1959. The Sheppey Crossing is not open to pedestrians, bicycles, or horses, and these continue to use the older bridge, as does the

railway line Rail terminology is a form of technical terminology. The difference between the American term ''railroad'' and the international term ''railway'' (used by the International Union of Railways and English-speaking countries outside the United Sta ...

Sheerness Sheerness () is a town and civil parish beside the mouth of the River Medway on the north-west corner of the Isle of Sheppey in north Kent, England. With a population of 11,938, it is the second largest town on the island after the nearby town ...

. Both bridges are monitored by an

automatic number plate recognition Automatic number-plate recognition (ANPR; see also #Other names, other names below) is a technology that uses optical character recognition on images to read vehicle registration plates to create vehicle location data. It can use existing close ...

(ANPR) system to detect lawbreaking vehicles.

Construction

The bridge was constructed as part of a £100 million plan to improve the A249 between the M2 and the port of Sheerness. The Kingsferry Bridge, which previously carried the A249, suffers from two major drawbacks: It has only one lane in each direction and as traffic to and from the island increased over time it became a

bottleneck Bottleneck literally refers to the narrowed portion (neck) of a bottle near its opening, which limit the rate of outflow, and may describe any object of a similar shape. The literal neck of a bottle was originally used to play what is now known as ...

. Secondly, it is a

vertical-lift bridge A vertical-lift bridge or just lift bridge is a type of movable bridge in which a span rises vertically while remaining parallel with the deck. The vertical lift offers several benefits over other movable bridges such as the bascule and swin ...

. It needs to be raised regularly to allow marine traffic to pass under it, leading to lengthy traffic delays. Before its opening, it was estimated that 26,000 vehicles a day would use the new crossing. A tunnel, as an alternative crossing, was advocated by the

Council for the Protection of Rural England CPRE, The Countryside Charity, formerly known by names such as the ''Council for the Preservation of Rural England'' and the ''Council for the Protection of Rural England'', is a charity in England with over 40,000 members and supporters. Forme ...

and others, on landscape and safety grounds. This was rejected primarily on environmental grounds, the site being within and by

Special Protection Area A Special Protection Area (SPA) is a designation under the European Union Directive on the Conservation of Wild Birds. Under the Directive, Member States of the European Union (EU) have a duty to safeguard the habitats of migratory birds and cert ...

s. The bridge was designed by Cass Hayward and

Capita Symonds Capita Property and Infrastructure (previously Capita Symonds) is a UK multidisciplinary consultancy operating in the building design, civil engineering, environment, management and transport sectors, part of the Capita Group. They employ arou ...

, and won the 2007 IStructE Award for Transportation Structures. Around 10,000

tonne The tonne ( or ; symbol: t) is a unit of mass equal to 1000 kilograms. It is a non-SI unit accepted for use with SI. It is also referred to as a metric ton to distinguish it from the non-metric units of the short ton ( United State ...

s of steel was used in construction, which was carried out by

Carillion Carillion plc was a British multinational construction and facilities management services company headquartered in Wolverhampton in the United Kingdom, prior to its liquidation in January 2018. Carillion was created in July 1999, following a ...

under a

private finance initiative The private finance initiative (PFI) was a United Kingdom government procurement policy aimed at creating "public–private partnerships" (PPPs) where private firms are contracted to complete and manage public projects. Initially launched in 199 ...

contract, was made more difficult because many of the bridge's piers had to be built on

marsh A marsh is a wetland that is dominated by herbaceous rather than woody plant species.Keddy, P.A. 2010. Wetland Ecology: Principles and Conservation (2nd edition). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK. 497 p Marshes can often be found at ...

land. A

jacking Jacking, Jackin’, or the jack is a freestyle dance move in which the dancer ripples their torso back and forth in an undulating motion. It emerged within the context of Chicago house music in the 1980s. Origins and interpretations The style i ...

mechanism was employed to move the sections of roadway into position from each end of the bridge, with the final two sections of deck lifted into place during November 2005. The bridge was opened on 3 July 2006, by the

Minister of Transport A ministry of transport or transportation is a ministry responsible for transportation within a country. It usually is administered by the ''minister for transport''. The term is also sometimes applied to the departments or other government agen ...

Stephen Ladyman Stephen John Ladyman (born 6 November 1952) is a British Labour Party politician who was the Member of Parliament (MP) for South Thanet from 1997 until 2010. Early life He attended the Birkenhead Institute Grammar School for Boys (became th ...

. A competition held to name the new bridge was won by lifelong Sheppey resident Reginald Grimwade, who was then invited to attend the opening ceremony and presented with an award by Ladyman.

Incidents

On the morning of 5 September 2013, more than 130 vehicles were involved in a series of shunt crashes on the southbound carriageway of the crossing which at the time was covered in heavy fog. Emergency services were called to the crossing at around 07:15 BST according to

Kent Police Kent Police is the territorial police force responsible for policing the and approximately 1.8 million inhabitants of Kent, a county in the south east of England. History On 14 January 1857, a 222-strong 'Kent County Constabulary' was formed u ...

and the bridge was subsequently closed for nine hours. Inappropriate driving in conditions of very poor visibility was suggested as the cause. There were eight serious injuries and 60 minor injuries, but no life-threatening injuries or deaths. Following the incident, questions were raised over the safety of the unlit bridge with calls for speed restrictions and overhead lights.

The AA AA Limited, trading as The AA (formerly The Automobile Association), is a British motoring association. Founded in 1905, it provides vehicle insurance, driving lessons, breakdown cover, loans, motoring advice, road maps and other services. Th ...

suggested matrix warning signs "as a minimum". The crossing was closed both ways on 1 July 2014 following the first fatal accident. A mother and her 8-year-old son died. Her 7-year-old son survived, but was airlifted to

King's College Hospital King's College Hospital is a major teaching hospital and major trauma centre in Denmark Hill, Camberwell in the London Borough of Lambeth, referred to locally and by staff simply as "King's" or abbreviated internally to "KCH". It is managed by K ...

, London. The crossing was closed on 9 February 2020 over safety concerns during

Storm Ciara Storm Ciara was a powerful and long-lived extratropical cyclone that was the first of a pair of European windstorms to affect the United Kingdom and Ireland at peak intensity less than a week apart in early February 2020, followed by Storm Denn ...

References

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External links

Sheppey Crossing at SteelConstruction.info

Highways Agency photo gallery

Highways Agency article on the opening ceremony
Bridges in Kent Borough of Swale Bridges completed in 2006 Isle of Sheppey