Humber Bridge

The Humber Bridge is the fifth-largest single-span suspension bridge in the world, near Kingston upon Hull in England.

Humber Bridge

Crosses                     Humber

Locale                       East Riding of Yorkshire/North Lincolnshire

Design                      Suspension

Total length             2,220 m (7,283 ft)

Longest span           1,410 m (4,626 ft) (fifth-largest in the world)

Opening date           To traffic on 24 June 1981

Officially on             17 July 1981

It spans the Humber (the estuary formed by the rivers Trent and Ouse) between Barton-upon-Humber on the south bank and Hessle on the north bank, connecting the East Riding of Yorkshire and North Lincolnshire. The bridge carries an average of 120,000 vehicles per week, which pay a toll of £2.70 each way for cars (higher for commercial vehicles).

History

Plans for a bridge were originally drawn up in the 1930s, and were revised in 1955, but work did not begin until July 26, 1972. The Humber Bridge Act, promoted by Kingston Upon Hull Corporation, was passed in 1959. This established the Humber Bridge Board in order to manage and raise funds to build the bridge and buy the land required for the approach roads.

However raising the necessary funding proved impossible until the 1966 Hull North by-election. To save his government, Labour Prime Minister Harold Wilson prevailed upon his Minister of Transport Barbara Castle to sanction the building of the bridge.

Dismay at the long wait for a crossing led to the writing by Christopher Rowe of a protest song entitled The Humber Bridge.

The bridge was finally opened officially by HM The Queen on 17 July 1981. The consulting engineers for the project were Freeman Fox & Partners — now Hyder Consulting. The main contractor was Sir William Arrol & Co. at that time part of Northern Engineering Industries plc.

The bridge held the record for the world's longest single-span suspension bridge for 16 years from its opening in June 1981 until the opening of the Great Belt Bridge in June 1997 and was relegated to third place with the opening of the Akashi-Kaikyo Bridge in April 1998. It is now the fifth longest single-span suspension bridge after two longer span bridges opened in China, the Xihoumen Bridge and the Runyang Bridge. It remains the longest bridge in the world that you can cross on foot. The bridge twice forms part of the route of the popular Humber Bridge Half Marathon.