Civil Engineering heritage: Scotland - Lowlands and Borders

A striking single-span dressed stone structure with a segmental arch of 81 1/2 ft span and 20 ft rise designed by Telford and built from 1823–25. The arch ring is 3 ft thick and the roadway about 45 ft above the river bed. The spandrels are hollow in accordance with Telford’s practice for large spans, with longitudinal, parallel-sided walls and four covered cavities extending from the arch upwards to just under the roadway. There is a 12 ft wide semicircular arch accommodation span alongside.

Although partly bypassed by the M74 motorway in 1969, this bridge still carries the A72 trunk road joining Larkhall and Lanark. A toll house still exists at the east end of the bridge (NS75SW 13.01).

R Paxton and J Shipway 2007

Reproduced from 'Civil Engineering heritage: Scotland - Lowlands and Borders' with kind permission of Thomas Telford Publishers.