Any day now ....

I've heard rumours, nothing more than whispers, that the new swing bridge will almost certainly definitely maybe perhaps open this very month or even sooner. You heard it here first.

Non-starter

One picture, two stories. First the on-going non-operation of the new footbridge, as you can see nothing has happened since I last reported in November [ 1 ]. The bridge is ready to rock as they say; both sides of the river have been landscaped and prepared but it just sits there like some beached whale. No-one has any idea when it will open or if they do they aren't saying. I suspect that like most things money or the lack thereof  lies at the bottom of this saga. Money lies at the bottom of the second story too. There have been calls to dredge the river to improve flood defenses. You can see how silted up it's becoming; where that mud is ships once berthed. A figure of £14.6 million was picked out of a hat (where else do they get these figures from?). Fortunately wiser counsels have said it would make little or no difference to water levels in Hull so that  scheme looks like a non-starter. Hull is very good at non-starting.

Mudlarking

Here under Myton bridge a traffic cone is slowly sinking into the ooze. This seems to be a favourite place for cones to go to die, I spotted three or four others in varying stages of disappearance. It brought to mind the strange but true phenomenon of the 'Cones Hotline' which was introduced in the 1990's by the hapless John Major for reporting errant traffic cones (in those days politicians worried about traffic cones instead of robbing the poor to pay the rich). Perhaps unsurprisingly the scheme was abandoned after it was found that many calls were frivolous, spoilsports!

“Nothing happens. Nobody comes, nobody goes. It's awful.”

And still we wait for the bridge to open.... Promised in September to open in October and here we are mid-November. What do we do now? Wait ....

Blue Bridge

Run out of interesting pictures so here's a boring blue bridge to be going on with. It's Cottingham station and that's the Hull train.

Park bridge

After yesterday's colourful display here's the East Park bridge which I've shown several times before but never in black and white.

See the Weekend in Black & White here.

Ever so nearly not quite finished

Six months after I last posted about the new bridge across the river and, well, it's sort of nearly ready. Here they're busy putting the finishing touches to the approach route. Rumour has it that it will be opened next month but there's no hurry as there's nothing on the other side of the river worth crossing over for.

If you haven't got a clue what I'm talking about catch up here, here and here.

Stoneferry Bridge

There's been a crossing at Stoneferry for centuries but the big business guys in Beverley prevented a bridge being built until 1905. They were worried about it blocking the navigation up the river to Beverley. That old bridge simply couldn't cope with the traffic volumes and so it was replaced in 1991 with this dual bascule bridge. It can lift to allow river traffic but there is very little of that nowadays.

Hull Road, Beverley

Around here a lot of roads lead to Hull and are called Hull Road. This can lead to confusion especially with the police who are, it has to be said, not the brightest stars in the firmament. Here Hull Road is neatly crossing over Beverley Beck.

Contre-jour

Here's the Myton bridge on a sunny day last week. The bridge can be lifted to allow shipping to pass underneath but that hardly ever happens these days.

Still building that old bridge

A big step forward in the making of this bridge happened in the last week or so when the 120 ton swinging arm was lifted into place. You can't see much in this foreshortened image so I crossed over the Myton bridge and took a shot from the other side of the river. To me it looks like a giant fish, can't quite see what that fin attachment is supposed to do but no doubt all will be revealed. The local paper confidently states the bridge will open in May so we'll just have to be patient a little longer ....

It was all yellow

In another lifetime I posted how work had started on building a new bridge across the Hull (here and here). Since then there's been a change of government and as I've mentioned before all things grind to a halt, change their names and then start again under the 'new' management. So it was a pleasant surprise to see that some progress has been made. The bridge when completed (later this year we are 'promised') will allow pedestrians to remain on it whilst it opens for boats to pass under. Below is the 'arm' that will swing and, although it's under wraps now, I can tell you it's all yellow.

Drypool Bridge

Drypool Bridge, Hull

The Drypool bridge was built in 1961 and replaced a much smaller bridge. It is designed to lift to allow river traffic to pass under; fortunately for road traffic this happens infrequently these days. You can appreciate that when the river bridges are under repair Hull's cross town traffic grinds to a halt.

For those with an engineering interest this is a bascule bridge; you can see an animation of how it works here.

Half a bridge

The new bridge is still unbuilt and if today's lack of activity is anything to go by it will remain that way. Still the river mud held some some nice reflections.

To build a bridge

In a bid to redevelop the Old Town, a fancy new footbridge is being built across the river. The fact that there is nothing on the other side of the river does not seem to deter these bold entrepreneurs. They are going to build a brave new world on the east bank where at present there is dereliction and decay. The project has been given  a name: the Boom (they've never heard of hubris in Hull!). It's that old "build it and they will come" spirit at work again. You can see what the bridge is going to look like here.

East Park, Hull

Hull has a river running through it which effectively splits the city in two. People tend to have an affinity to one side or the other. East Hull has the docks, west Hull had the fishing and food processing factories. Even the buses do not run from one side to the other. To get from where I live in west Hull to east Hull, I have to go into town and change buses. There is no through service.

This lake and fine restored bridge are in East Park, off Holderness Road, the main shopping area in East Hull. The park was recently cleaned up and renovated, not necessarily for the better. The lake, for example, had four or five small islands that broke up what is now a dull stretch of water. They were simply removed. I suppose they had to do something about the general decay that was overtaking the place but I miss the old mess and clutter. It's too clean and tidy for my liking.

This picture was taken about three weeks ago; the trees are more advanced now, though the weather is, if anything, much colder.