In the 1800s, coal was everything. With the Industrial Revolution, the rise of steam powered engines and factories, more companies were demanding cheap and reliable fuel but it was difficult to transport across the country. That’s where Preston’s old tram bridge comes in, but why was it made, how did it work and why has it been rebuilt so many times?
Big business
During the Industrial Revolution, Britain relied heavily on coal to power mills, steam engines, transport, and rapidly growing industrial towns. Coal had been extracted from Wigan since Roman times, but demand exploded during the Industrial Revolution as factories, homes and transport networks expanded across Lancashire. This meant that coal mines effectively became gold mines with the material being in high demand across the country. This created a need for canals and tramroads, to move coal across Lancashire and the country in a faster and cheaper way.
The canal’s creation
Lancashire’s roads were poor and slow, so alternative travel routes became essential. Under the Westmoreland Canals Act of 1792, the Lancaster Canal was developed to improve links between Kendal and Wigan. By 1799, large sections had opened, but there was still a major problem. The southern end struggled to attract trade, mainly because Preston, a key coal consumer, was difficult to reach.
The Lancaster Canal Company realised that Preston could be better reached via the Leeds and Liverpool canal. In 1799, engineer William Cartwright estimated it would cost £172,945 to fully complete the canal (£25 million today), but only £60,000 to build a temporary tramroad instead (£8.5 million today). Parliament then passed the Lancaster Canal Act in 1800 granting the company the authority to raise up to £200,000 to build the tramroad and complete the project.
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The tramroad is built
Two years later, in 1802, work began on a fully timber bridge across the River Ribble and in 1804 the tram bridge officially opened. Although the ‘trams’ crossing it looked very different to what people imagine today. Instead of electric trams, the bridge carried pack horse trams, horse-drawn wagons loaded with coal and goods.
The tramroad itself stretched around five miles and even used an early steam-powered hauling system to help wagons climb steep slopes. Due to the difficulty of getting their horse-drawn wagons up the slope, once drivers reached the incline near the bridge, their horses would be unchained from their wagons and attached to a constantly moving, steam-powered chain. The chain would then drag the heavy wagons uphill before the horses were reattached further along the route.
But it could also be dangerous.
Incidents on the bridge
In October 1826, one of the chains broke and the wagon sped down the slope towards owner John Roberts, he came out relatively unscathed but his two horses plunged into the River Ribble below.
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A bridge with a view
Despite this, the bridge still found itself at the centre of Preston life. In July 1837, crowds gathered on the tram bridge to watch the first Mormon baptisms take place in the River Ribble, an event that would later become an important moment in the city’s religious history.
The decline
After around 40 years, the bridge had already fallen into disrepair. Railways has become increasingly popular due to the success of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, the world’s first steam-powered, urban railway. It demonstrated a faster and more comfortable way to travel and trade and meant that the importance of tram systems started to decline.
In 1872, it was acquired by the Preston Corporation and Western Railway Company following the Lancaster Canal Transfer Act of 1864, before being repaired again in the 1890s.
The 20th century brought even more problems. Flooding badly damaged the bridge in 1936 and during the Second World War the timber deck was removed entirely amid fears it could help a German invasion force advance inland. By the 1960s, inspections revealed parts of the timber were rotting and the bridge was shut once again in 1964. Engineers decided large sections would need replacing, including parts of the timber and concrete structure.
Read more: Your pictures of the new tram bridge
In 1965, contractors Matthews and Mumby’s were brought in by the council’s Park Committee to rebuild the bridge at a cost of £17,725, money approved through a government loan that April. But despite decades of repairs and rebuilds, the bridge’s condition continued to worsen. A major inspection in 2013 found the structure was in very poor condition due to the connections between the beams seeming to have failed and become rotten. By 2019 it had been closed to the public once again. Then, in 2024, the historic bridge was finally demolished after engineers found the beam connections had failed beyond repair.
Its back again!
However, hope was not lost, due to a major government-backed funding programme as part of Preston’s successful Levelling Up Fund bid in 2022. Work in 2023, led by Eric Wright Civil Engineering, with a complex construction process that included building temporary access routes across River Ribble and lifting the new 130-metre structure into four sections.
The finished bridge was designed to reflect its historic form while providing a far more durable crossing, and it was officially reopened in 2026 after more than seven years! Have you been to see it?
