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Forth Road Bridge

The Forth Road Bridge is a suspension bridge in east central Scotland. The bridge, opened in 1964, spans the Firth of Forth, connecting Edinburgh, at Queensferry, to Fife, at North Queensferry. It replaced a centuries-old ferry service to carry vehicular traffic, cyclists and pedestrians across the Forth; railway crossings are made by the adjacent Forth Bridge, opened in 1890.

 

The Scottish Parliament voted to scrap tolls on the bridge from February 2008. The bridge was nearing the end of its life in the 2010s, and a parallel replacement was built. On 5 September 2017 the bridge carried its final private cars, as the vast majority of traffic was transferred to the new Queensferry Crossing, seen here in the background. Following a few weeks closure for repairs, the new role of the Forth Road Bridge was as a public transport corridor, open only to buses, taxis, cyclists and pedestrians. At its peak, the Forth Road Bridge carried 65,000 vehicles per day (vpd), which is now expected to drop to only a few hundred following the opening of the Queensferry Crossing. Its probably now the biggest footbridge in the world.

 

The Queensferry Crossing (formerly the Forth Replacement Crossing) was built alongside the existing Forth Road Bridge and carries the M90 motorway across the Firth of Forth between Edinburgh, at South Queensferry, and Fife, at North Queensferry.

 

Proposals for a second Forth Road crossing, to meet unexpected demand, were first put forward in the 1990s, but no action was taken until structural issues were discovered in the Forth Road Bridge in 2004. In 2006-2007 Transport Scotland carried out a study and in December 2007, took the decision to proceed with a replacement bridge. The following year it was announced that the existing bridge would be retained as a public transport link. The Forth Crossing Act received Royal Assent in January 2011. In April 2011, the Forth Crossing Bridge Constructors Consortium were awarded the contract and construction began in late Summer/Autumn of 2011.

 

The Queensferry Crossing is a three-tower cable-stayed bridge, with an overall length of 2.7 kilometres (1.7 miles). Around 4 kilometres (2.5 miles) of new connecting roads were built, including new and upgraded junctions at Ferrytoll in Fife, South Queensferry and Junction 1A on the M9.

 

The bridge was first due to be completed by December 2016, but this deadline was extended to August 2017 after several delays. It is the third bridge across the Forth at Queensferry, alongside the Forth Road Bridge completed in 1964, and the Forth Rail Bridge completed in 1890. Following a public vote, it was formally named on 26 June 2013 and opened to traffic on 30 August 2017. The official opening was carried out on 4 September 2017 by Queen Elizabeth II, fifty-three years to the day after she opened the adjacent Forth Road Bridge.

 

The Firth of Forth is the estuary (firth) of several Scottish rivers including the River Forth. It meets the North Sea with Fife on the north coast and Lothian on the south. It was known as Bodotria in Roman times. In the Norse sagas it was known as the Myrkvifiörd.

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forth_Road_Bridge

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queensferry_Crossing

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firth_of_Forth

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Uploaded on February 19, 2021
Taken on September 6, 2017