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Viewed from the Ribble Way. The suburb of Avenham is behind at the top of the hill.
©Bill Boaden
Dist:0.1km<br/>This tree evidently lost its footing some time ago, and has been left to form a graceful sculpture.
©Patrick
Dist:0.3km<br/>alongside the River Ribble - looking West.
©Margaret Clough
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©Betty Longbottom
Dist:0.3km<br/>
©Betty Longbottom
Dist:0.4km<br/>It now just carries a footpath over the Ribble.
©Bill Boaden
Dist:0.4km<br/>Lack of the money needed to duplicate Rennie's Lune Aqueduct at Lancaster across the River Ribble at Preston caused the proprietors of the Lancaster Canal to settle in 1803 for a 4-mile-long tramroad to connect the two parts of their canal, the South End of which ran from Wigan to Walton Summit near Bamber Bridge and the North End running from Fishergate in Preston to Kendal in Westmorland. This enabled them to build a low-level wooden bridge across the Ribble with inclines both sides to take wagons down from and back up to the canal level. The incline on the north side started on the bridge — the far end two spans can be seen sloping slightly upwards — and continued up through the woods. Two hundred years is a long time for a wooden bridge to survive in a river with powerful currents, especially as it ceased to be used by the tramway around 1860, and more recently it has been replaced by a concrete replica as seen here from the south bank of the river.
©A-M-Jervis
Dist:0.4km<br/>The bridge is the Tram Bridge, built instead of a viaduct when the Lancaster Canal was built, the canal was to join up with the Leeds and Liverpool at Westhoughton, with viaducts over the Rivers Lune and Ribble, the Ribble viaduct was not built because of cost, instead a tram way was built and this bridge. http://www.engineering-timelines.com/scripts/engineeringItem.asp?id=648
©Alexander P Kapp
Dist:0.4km<br/>Constructed for commercial use, not public transport. Between 1802 and 1854 horse-drawn trains transported coal, cotton and wool between the Lancaster Canal and the Leeds-Liverpool Canal. It was reconstructed in the 1960s and is now a useful foot and cycle bridge over the River Ribble. The wooden beams were replaced by concrete look-alikes. (from the information board outside The Belvedere)
©Humphrey Bolton
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©Betty Longbottom
Dist:0.4km<br/>Middle Class housing overlooking the Park.
©Betty Longbottom
Dist:0.4km<br/>The original wooden tram bridge has been replaced by this convincing replica in concrete. Not visible here is the pumping station that provided the power to pull the trams up a steep slope once they had crossed the bridge from the south. (Part of a circular walk around Preston – continues at [[557146]].)
©Patrick
Dist:0.4km<br/>The Lancaster Canal, running from Wigan to Kendal, existed in two parts. Lack of the funds necessary to build an aqueduct across the Ribble in Preston, perhaps even more monumental than that on the canal near Lancaster, left a four-mile gap that was eventually filled by constructing a tramway. The Ribble still had to be bridged, but this could be done at a lower level and the tramway could use rope-worked inclines to get down to the river and back up again the other side. This pavilion in Avenham Park, on the north side of the river, is approximately on the site of the engine-house that wound the tramway trucks up and down. The group of mackintoshed and umbrella-wielding people are standing on a path that follows the course of the incline.
©A-M-Jervis
Dist:0.4km<br/>The premises are now used by Virgin Mobile.
©Betty Longbottom
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©Betty Longbottom

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