Keadby Canal - Vazon Bridge

On an outing with Daniel, by train to Cleethorpes, we passed over the Vazon Bridge on the Keadby Canal. When we got home, I decided to do a bit of research on the bridge. In an anoraky way, it's quite fascinating.

The Vazon Bridge is a sliding bridge. When activated, the whole deck of the bridge carrying the two railway lines slides out of the way, clearing the way for the boats to pass through.

It takes around two minutes from first movement of the bridge to clear the canal, allow a boat to pass and return the tracks back to their rightful place, although that cleary depends on how many boats are passing. The actual cycle time is much longer than that, presumably allowing for the motors to spin up etc. The (annoying but necessary) siren runs for nearly five minutes.

The Pennine Waterways website has some information on the bridge as it was in 2003. Since then, it would appear that the bridge has been replaced by a similar one which would account for the shiny paint when we visited. There are (obviously) these pictures of the bridge and surrounding area, and I've also got a two minute video (4Mb) showing the bridge opening and closing. Unfortunately, it isn't the best video I've ever done and in hindsight, it's taken from the wrong side, but it's Moving Pictures. The video is in WMV format - I'l recode it into mpeg-1 soon.

As you approach the bridge from I suppose what you could call the 'Don' end, up towards the signal box, this is the view from the path.

In the background is Keadby Power Station, a 680MW combined cycle gas turbine power station, built on the site of a former coal-fired station [ref]. There's also a plan to build a wind farm on land adjacent to the power station which will, if it comes off, provide enough green energy to supply 74% of the homes in North Lincolnshire [ref]. (This and all the other pictures link to larger views of the same image around 100k. If you want high resolution images, you can contact me).

Heading from Keadby and the Trent lock towards the bridge you'd get something akin to this view.

The white house on the right of the bridge is adjacent to the swing bridge which allows the road to the signal box (amongst other places) to be moved out ofthe way to allow boats to pass.

Just to prove the existence of rail traffic, a DMU heading for Doncaster, probably ex Cleethorpes, rattles over the bridge, No. 1 wife and small son in foreground! Before anyone says anything, you're looking at the back of the unit, not the front, so it's just leaving the bridge, not about to run on to it.

A better shot of the bridge and signal box from the Trent side, sans famille.

The final two shots show the pedestrian walkway and a close-up of the track where it splits. You should just be able to make out the break in the rails. Interestingly, there are two walkways across the bridge, and which one is used depends on whether the bridge is open or closed, hence the "Deep Water" sign on the gate that appears to open straight over the canal.

Images and text (c) David Morris, 2005 :: last updated 26-Aug-2005