Wide-Angle Wednesday: Supports

I seem to be getting maximum blip-mileage out of Armstrong Bridge for WidWed blips recently (see here and here).
 
Anyway as we’re still in September I thought that Supports was a reasonable title, as Bobsblips likes us to match the subject to the first and/or last letter of the name of the month.

Son #3 currently lives in Jesmond, and borrowed our car while we were away. As he's very busy this week I offered to walk to Jesmond to collect it from outside his flat. This meant a walk across Jesmond Dene.

 The supports for Armstrong Bridge, which spans the Dene, are interesting. As the bridge stands on land previously mined for coal, Armstrong designed it so that it would adjust itself if the ground below moved. It was the first bridge in the world to be able to do this: the design give it strength but retains flexibility. As it’s still standing 137 years after its construction, one assumes that the design was successful. It was, however, not strong enough for heavy lorries when they appeared on the scene, and was closed even to car traffic in 1963 as it was feared that it could not bear the increase in traffic density. It was threatened with demolition in the 1970s owing to the high cost of maintenance but was saved by popular appeal and continues to provide a useful route for pedestrians and cyclists; a famous craft market occurs on the bridge at weekends.