Lambley Viaduct

Lambley viaduct crosses the River South Tyne as a series of elegant stone arches. More than 260m long, it once carried the Haltwhistle to Alston railway. The railway opened in 1852 to haul coal and lead from the Alston mines, was closed in 1976, and the viaduct allowed to decay. In 1991 the British Rail Property Board agreed to repair the viaduct and hand it over to the North Pennine Heritage Trust who would maintain it in the future.

The viaduct may have been designed by George Barclay Bruce, an eminent Victorian engineer who was involved in the Alston line before leaving for India to pioneer railway construction there. It is a particularly elegant example of Victorian engineering: the river is crossed by nine 17-metre wide arches which support a deck above the river but, as it carried a single rail track, only 3.5 metres wide. The piers to the arches are built of massive rough-faced stones each weighing up to 500 kilograms , with similar-sized stones in ashlar to the main arch voussoirs. The spandrels and piers to the wide approach arches are built of coursed rubble masonry. One end of the viaduct has been fenced off to stop people straying into Lambley railway station which is now a private house.