The Tramway Bridge is a

grade II listed 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 ...

pedestrian bridge crossing the River Avon at

Stratford-upon-Avon Stratford-upon-Avon (), commonly known as just Stratford, is a market town and civil parish in the Stratford-on-Avon district, in the county of Warwickshire, in the West Midlands region of England. It is situated on the River Avon, north-we ...

Warwickshire Warwickshire (; abbreviated Warks) is a county in the West Midlands region of England. The county town is Warwick, and the largest town is Nuneaton. The county is famous for being the birthplace of William Shakespeare at Stratford-upon-Avon an ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

. The bridge was built in 1823, originally to carry a

tramway track Tramway track is used on tramways or light rail operations. Grooved rails (or girder rails) are often used to provide a protective flangeway in the trackwork in city streets. Like standard rail tracks, tram tracks consist of two parallel st ...

of the horse-drawn

Stratford and Moreton Tramway The Stratford and Moreton Tramway was a 16-mile (25-km) long horse-drawn wagonway which ran from the canal basin at Stratford-upon-Avon in Warwickshire to Moreton-in-Marsh in Gloucestershire, with a branch to Shipston-on-Stour. The main line open ...

. It was designed by

John Urpeth Rastrick John Urpeth Rastrick (26 January 1780 – 1 November 1856) was one of the first English steam locomotive builders. In partnership with James Foster, he formed Foster, Rastrick and Company, the locomotive construction company that built the ''S ...

. It consists of eight elliptical arches, and is made from brick, with

ashlar Ashlar () is finely dressed (cut, worked) stone, either an individual stone that has been worked until squared, or a structure built from such stones. Ashlar is the finest stone masonry unit, generally rectangular cuboid, mentioned by Vitruv ...

- coped

parapet A parapet is a barrier that is an extension of the wall at the edge of a roof, terrace, balcony, walkway or other structure. The word comes ultimately from the Italian ''parapetto'' (''parare'' 'to cover/defend' and ''petto'' 'chest/breast'). Whe ...

s. The tramway had fallen into disuse by 1904, and the track was lifted in 1918. It has since then been used a public footbridge, and is an important element in the landscape around the

Royal Shakespeare Theatre The Royal Shakespeare Theatre (RST) (originally called the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre) is a grade II* listed 1,040+ seat thrust stage theatre owned by the Royal Shakespeare Company dedicated to the English playwright and poet William Shakespe ...

. The bridge gained grade II listing in 1951. In 2010 the local council fitted strip lights down on the footway to simulate the historic tracks, however these were abandoned in 2020 after they repeatedly broke down. The bridge is around to the west of, and downstream from the much older

Clopton Bridge The Clopton Bridge is a Late Medieval masonry arch bridge with 14 pointed arches, located in Stratford-upon-Avon, England, which spans the River Avon, crossing at the place where the river was forded in Saxon times, and which gave the town it ...

which dates from the 15th century. Two further relics of the old tramway are located immediately to the north of the bridge: An old

toll house A tollhouse or toll house is a building with accommodation for a toll collector, beside a tollgate on a toll road, canal, or toll bridge. History Many tollhouses were built by turnpike trusts in England, Wales and Scotland during the 18th and ...

known as Tramway House at the northern end of the bridge which is also grade II listed. And a restored wagon of the tramway, which is located and displayed about to the north of the bridge, with an information board about the history of the tramway. File:Bridges_Crossing_the_River_Avon,_geograph_7461717_by_Philip_Halling.jpg, Tramway Bridge, with

in the background File:Tramway Bridge, Stratford-upon-Avon.jpg, View from the bridge deck, looking west File:Tramway House - panoramio.jpg, Tramway House, former toll house adjacent to the bridge.

References

{{coord, 52.191075, -1.701431, type:landmark_region:GB, display=title Buildings and structures in Stratford-upon-Avon Bridges in Warwickshire Grade II listed bridges in Warwickshire Bridges completed in 1823 Arch bridges in the United Kingdom