| Sheppey Crossing | |
|---|---|
| Carries | 4 Lane dual carriageway Road |
| Crosses | The Swale |
| Locale | Isle of Sheppey, Kent, UK |
| Width | 21 metres (70 feet) |
| Vertical clearance | 35 metres (115 feet) |
| Opened | July 3, 2006 |
The Sheppey Crossing is a four-lane road bridge which crosses The Swale at a height of 35m (115 ft), linking the Isle of Sheppey with mainland Kent. It was opened on July 3, 2006 by Minister for Transport, Stephen Ladyman and provides an alternative to the old Kingsferry Bridge for road users.
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The pre-existing Kingsferry Bridge, in place since 1959, suffers from two major drawbacks. Firstly, it has only one lane in each direction and as traffic to and from the island increased over time it became a bottleneck.[1] Secondly, it is a vertical-lift bridge and needs to be raised regularly to allow marine traffic to pass under it, leading to lengthy traffic delays.[2]
Prior to its opening it was estimated that 26,000 vehicles a day would use the new crossing.[1]
The bridge was designed by Cass Hayward and Capita Symonds, and won the 2007 IStructE Award for Transportation Structures.
It has been built from steel and concrete, with around 10,000 tonnes of British Steel being used. Construction, which was carried out by Carillion[3] under a Private Finance Initiative contract, was made more difficult because many of the bridge's piers had to be built on marshland.
A jacking mechanism was employed to move the sections of roadway into position from each end of the bridge, with the final two sections of deck (piers 7-8 and piers 15-17) lifted into place during November 2005. The bridge project was part of a larger scheme costing £100m to improve the A249 road between the M2 motorway and the port of Sheerness.[4]
The new crossing measures 21.5m (71 ft) in width, and carries the a section on the now-widened A249 road which links the M20 and M2 motorways to Sheppey.
The Sheppey Crossing is not open to pedestrians, bicycles or horses, which continue to use the Kingsferry Bridge. The Sittingbourne to Sheerness section of railway also uses the Kingsferry Bridge.
It was announced police have borrowed £73,000 from Swale Council to place an order for an automatic number plate recognition system (ANPR), which will be installed on both the Sheppey Crossing and the Kingsferry Bridge by the middle of April 2010.[5]
A competition was announced to name the new bridge, won by lifelong Sheppey resident Mr. Reginald Grimwade, who was invited to attend the opening ceremony and was presented with an award by Dr Ladyman.[6]