Hammersmith Bridge closed to motor vehicles "indefinitely"

[T & P]

People have staged a protest on the South side a day or two ago demanding action and a pedestrian bridge. They say they were promised this long ago. Estimated cost for temporary pedestrian bridge £25M. Local councils cannot afford it. TFL cannot afford it.

Every armred forces in the world have plenty of quick bridge building vehicles/ platforms in their arsenals than can erect a working bridge in a matter of hours, do they not? They were commonplace enough in WWII.

Is the Thames at Hammersmith too deep/ wide for such vehicles to handle? Because otherwise I very much doubt the MOD's bill would amount to anywhere near £25m.

 

[Saul Goodman]

Every armred forces in the world have plenty of quick bridge building vehicles/ platforms in their arsenals than can erect a working bridge in a matter of hours, do they not? They were commonplace enough in WWII.

Is the Thames at Hammersmith too deep/ wide for such vehicles to handle? Because otherwise I very much doubt the MOD's bill would amount to anywhere near £25m.

24.7 Million is consultation fees.
You could build a four lane motorway over it for that sort of money

 

[hash tag]

I doubt you could buy enough houses/flats for £25M from either side of river which would need to be demolished to make way for a new road.

 

[farmerbarleymow]

You wouldn't keep an old TV that wasn't working but looked nice. Why keep a non-working bridge? Demolish it and build a new one.

Why bother with the expense of a new bridge - residents can swim across the river if they want to cross at that point.

 

[T & P]

Time to bring back the Thames Watermen As cheap a solution as there’ll be

 

[Saul Goodman]

I doubt you could buy enough houses/flats for £25M from either side of river which would need to be demolished to make way for a new road.

Why would you need a new road for a pedestrian bridge?

 

[Saul Goodman]

Why bother with the expense of a new bridge - residents can swim across the river if they want to cross at that point.

Fuck 'em. Let them walk around. The exercise will do them good.

 

[platinumsage]

Time to bring back the Thames Waterman As cheap a solution as there’ll be

View attachment 227385

Probably more expensive than tube drivers, it was such a closed shop you basically had to be descended from a multi-generational tree of watermen to get a look in.

 

[Teaboy]

People have staged a protest on the South side a day or two ago demanding action and a pedestrian bridge. They say they were promised this long ago. Estimated cost for temporary pedestrian bridge £25M. Local councils cannot afford it. TFL cannot afford it.

The good people of Barnes who live in LBRUT demanding that LBK&C build a new bridge for them? Well I never.

 

[Teaboy]

Time to bring back the Thames Watermen As cheap a solution as there’ll be

View attachment 227385

There's a foot ferry still going strong at Twickenham, only a quid as well. They even take cards these days to remain covid compliant. Must irritate them that their income is suddenly somewhat visible.

 

[Lancman]

At present both the river and the bridge are closed.
Build a whole new bridge on the dry land to the west of the present bridge orientated in any optimum direction and divert the river under it. Re-align the roads.
Problem solved.
Spoil from the new cut could be moved and stored downriver in barges. If the tides are worked right the transport costs would be minimal. If the new spoil is insufficient to fill the old river bed the barges could be made of concrete and sunk in the old bed.
Sell the old bridge, which is now on dry land, for scrap.
Any questions?

 

[Teaboy]

At present both the river and the bridge are closed.
Build a whole new bridge on the dry land to the west of the present bridge orientated in any optimum direction and divert the river under it. Re-align the roads.
Problem solved.
Spoil from the new cut could be moved and stored downriver in barges. If the tides are worked right the transport costs would be minimal. If the new spoil is insufficient to fill the old river bed the barges could be made of concrete and sunk in the old bed.
Sell the old bridge, which is now on dry land, for scrap.
Any questions?

I have one. To the nearest hundred million what would your cost estimates be and please bear in mind it costs £50m to not build a bridge on the Thames?

 

[Lancman]

I have one. To the nearest hundred million what would your cost estimates be and please bear in mind it costs £50m to not build a bridge on the Thames?

I'm an Engineer not an accountant, there are people for that. Just don't form a committee.

 

[Teaboy]

I'm an Engineer not an accountant, there are people for that. Just don't form a committee.

Ha ha ha. I was in a meeting the other day when an engineer used the phrase "The cost is largely irrelevant". It was not a view shared by everyone in the meeting.

 

[T & P]

So perhaps the IRA had done their homework when they chose to bomb this particular bridge, as the most likely to collapse? It certainly seems to be the weakest of all London crossings and then some.

 

[Gromit]

You wouldn't keep an old TV that wasn't working but looked nice. Why keep a non-working bridge? Demolish it and build a new one.

The bridge is weak because the IRA kept exploding bombs on it.

If your mum was knackered because she got got beaten up by terrorists would you just chuck her out and get a new mum?

 

[platinumsage]

The bridge is weak because the IRA kept exploding bombs on it.

If your mum was knackered because she got got beaten up by terrorists would you just chuck her out and get a new mum?

Yeah they should have had the office workers just carry on working in the wreckage of the twin towers, instead of clearing it away and building a new tower.

 

[Saul Goodman]

The bridge is weak because the IRA kept exploding bombs on it.

If your mum was knackered because she got got beaten up by terrorists would you just chuck her out and get a new mum?

Fuck off Gromit.

 

[skyscraper101]

Army asked if they can build a new London bridge over the River Thames

There are fears Hammersmith is being cut off from the rest of the capital because of it

www.mylondon.news

Even the Army have fucked it off now

Local MP, Sarah Olney, alongside the council's transport committee chair, Alexander Ehmann, have written a joint letter to the Army and Secretary of State for Defence, Ben Wallace, asking for military assistance in evaluating and potentially deploying an emergency temporary bridge linking Barnes and Hammersmith.

However and MOD spokesperson said: “The UK Armed Forces are always willing to provide support to civil authorities where we are able to add value.

“In this instance, having taken account of available capabilities, we have suggested that the task may be more suited to a civil agency or private company.”

 

[hash tag]

There is an issue of people who lived one side of the river, worked on the other and walked to work, same for school children.
I see there is now talk of a ferry to get pedestrians and cyclists across the river. Great, except it couldnt operate at low tide

 

[farmerbarleymow]

There is an issue of people who lived one side of the river, worked on the other and walked to work, same for school children.
I see there is now talk of a ferry to get pedestrians and cyclists across the river. Great, except it couldnt operate at low tide

It's such a shame there are no other bridges across the river isn't it.

 

[T & P]

It's such a shame there are no other bridges across the river isn't it.

Well I can’t be arsed to google it but I’d imagine you’re looking at the best part of two miles in either direction for the nearest crossing? As a one-off it’s not very daunting but regular commuting pedestrians having to add several miles a day to every journey must suck arse big way, and might be too much walking for a lot of people to do regularly.

And as for other types of commuters, with London and Vauxhall Bridges currently closed to motorised traffic altogether, and Wandsworth Bridge suffering from deliberately restricted capacity, crossing the river in London has become hell on Earth. Easily adding 30+ min to everyone on more than two wheels, including bus users.

Even cyclists are affected to some degree, as the approaches to all the remaining bridges and also the wider nearby areas alongside the Thames are frequently gridlocked, and on the many streets that don’t have a cycle lane, gridlocked traffic slows progress considerably.

 

[klang]

why can't they just drain the thames? not used for much these days...

 

[T & P]

why can't they just drain the thames? not used for much these days...

I wonder how many unexploded WWII bombs might be embedded in the mud down there...

 

[Bahnhof Strasse]

why can't they just drain the thames? not used for much these days...

No need to drain it, just lob in a load of bags of concrete and once set stick a rail line on it, will stretch from Reading to Essex, as it will be rail that crosses London we could call it Crossrail. Will be up and running by Christmas.

 

[skyscraper101]

Another indirect annoyance with all this, is that I can no longer get any Chinese delivered from my favorite takeaway in Castlenau via Uber Eats because no fucker is hanging around there to take deliveries if they're cut off from Hammersmith and all that potential business north of the river.

They need to pull their finger out, and stop faffing about. Load of bollocks.

 

[farmerbarleymow]

No need to drain it, just lob in a load of bags of concrete and once set stick a rail line on it, will stretch from Reading to Essex, as it will be rail that crosses London we could call it Crossrail. Will be up and running by Christmas.

With the added benefit of blocking the river at the same time, and flooding a large part of the home counties with a giant reservoir solving the water shortages in one go. What's not to like about that idea.

 

[Bahnhof Strasse]

Another indirect annoyance with all this, is that I can no longer get any Chinese delivered from my favorite takeaway in Castlenau via Uber Eats because no fucker is hanging around there to take deliveries if they're cut off from Hammersmith and all that potential business north of the river.

They need to pull their finger out, and stop faffing about. Load of bollocks.

Worse than Hitler.

 

[skyscraper101]

Lol

Pupils at £39,000 St Paul's School ferried across Thames in BOATS

Fed-up parents of pupils at a £39,000-a-year bankside school have been using small boats to cross the River Thames after Hammersmith Bridge was closed for repairs

www.dailymail.co.uk

 

[TopCat]

The bridge must be in very poor condition to warrant banning cycles and pedestrians.