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Forth Naturalist and Historian, volume 22 133
BRIDGES OF THE RIVER FORTH AND ITS TRIBUTARIES
Louis Stott
Introduction
The Forth is bridged by more distinguished bridges than most rivers, and
they are insufficiently celebrated. Stirling Old Bridge occupies a particular
place in the affections of all Scots, and has played a notable part in the history
of the country. The Forth Road Bridge at Kincardine-on-Forth was the largest
swing bridge in the world when built in 1936. The Forth Rail Bridge by Fowler
and Baker remains, well over a hundred years after it began to be built, one of
the engineering wonders of the world. The Brig o’ Forth at Aberfoyle is steeped
in spurious associations with ‘Rob Roy’. The Forth Road Bridge is one of the
finest examples of modern engineering in Britain, and there are a number of
others which, anywhere else, would receive a good deal of attention. Robert
Stevenson’s Stirling Bridge of 1931, Drip Bridge, Cardross Bridge, and Bridge
o` Frew all have considerable interest; indeed there is no bridge over the Forth
without its attractions.
The tributaries of the Forth are bridged by a dozen further notable bridges;
Brig o’ Turk in the heart of the Trossachs, Bracklinn Brig, hurled dramatically
across a roaring waterfall; and Rumbling Bridge on the Devon, double-decked
like the famous Pont du Diable in the St Gothard Pass. Others are of
considerable architectural or historical interest, for example, one of Telford’s
most spectacular bridges is hardly known beyond the Stirling district, although
it is situated in a place renowned throughout the world, Bannockburn. Pontifex
Maximus, as Telford was dubbed, carried his arch to its logical conclusion, a full
circle, in the gorge of the little village’s Bannock Burn. Bannockburn Bridge is
worth seeking out. Other examples include Callander Brig, the ‘ancient’ bridge
across the Keltie, and the ‘Roman’ bridge at Kilmahog.
See the Appendix for tabled data on the bridges – Table 1 for the Forth and Table 2
for the tributaries – and illustrations of some at the end
Bridges of the Lower Forth
There is no doubt that the two bridges across the Firth of Forth are
remarkable. Two such eminently successful solutions to the same problem,
each so characteristic of its generation, cannot be so neatly juxtaposed
anywhere else in the world. Both represent the finest architectural and
engineering achievements of their day, which are intertwined in them, and,
this is the thing about them, they set one another off. Whether the eye is filled
with the ponderous grandour of the one, or enraptured by the spidery finesse
of the other – and it is possible from the vantage-point of the Hawes Inn to
dwell on either.
It must be acknowledged that neither of these massive presences detracts
from the other, and, whatever superlatives may be applied to the first, more