3-047-008 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Otago Great Northern Railway, New Zealand: Waitaki Railway Bridge, 1872. 'View from a drawing by John Millar, civil engineer,...[who] proposes the construction of a double-gallery bridge, designed upon the principle of Warren's girder, having twenty spans of 132 ft. each, resting on twin-cylinder concrete piles, which it is proposed to sink under pneumatic pressure. The first or lower stage of the bridge, is appropriated exclusively to the ordinary road traffic of the country...The river Waitangi, a name that means the "Weeping Water," is shown in the drawing at its lowest ebb, when it exposes a wide expanse of shingle banks; but, being subject to frequent floods occasioned by capricious thaws of snow upon the distant mountains, care has been taken to provide for an expansion of the river to a mile in width, running at a speed of ten knots an hour. The upper stage, or gallery, of the bridge is to be exclusively devoted to the railway line. The rails are laid upon longitudinal sleepers, having a layer of vulcanised indiarubber between the rail and sleeper to deaden the rumbling noise generally attendant on the passing of trains over bridges of either iron or wooden construction'. From "Illustrated London News", 1872.