Harwich Train Ferry Berth

Train Ferry Berth

This train ferry berth was erected in 1923 by the London and North Eastern Railway, incorporating reused components from earlier train ferry berths constructed at Richborough and Southampton in 1917, probably by Armstrong Whitworth and Company Ltd of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, to designs by the Inland Water Transport and Docks Department of the Royal Engineers. The structure has been disused since 1987.

The berth is constructed from fabricated steel girders with sheet steel cladding and a timber-decked train bridge. The foundations and landside approach bridge are reinforced concrete with sheet steel piles, while the pedestrian walkway and berthing arms are steel-framed with timber decks.

On plan the train ferry berth is rectangular, comprising a concrete approach bridge built in 1923, and an adjustable train bridge (linkspan) from 1917, straddled by a steel-framed gantry surmounted by a motor house, also from 1917. A pedestrian walkway built in 1923 runs parallel with the bridge's south side, extending from the concrete approach bridge to the southern berthing arm. A shorter berthing arm lies to the north. The 1917 components are of greatest interest.

The central element is a steel-framed gantry straddling and supporting the adjustable train bridge. The gantry's support legs are bolted to reinforced-concrete foundations and constructed from fabricated steel plates and angles riveted together to form box sections. King struts on the east side of each leg provide main lateral stability, while the legs themselves are hollow to accommodate the vertical travel of the bridge's lifting mechanism counterweights. Spanning the legs are two deep plate girders placed a short distance apart to allow the cable winch and bridge cable retention system to operate between them. A gantry platform with chequer plate decking, accessed by a steel ladder fixed to the southern king strut, is suspended below the girders.

From this platform a short steel ladder rises to the motor house, which sits on top of the girders. The motor house is constructed from steel angle frames arched at roof level and clad with light-steel plate. It accommodates the main bull wheel and the north-side counterweight cable wheel. An access walkway surrounds the machine house, fabricated from steel angles forming a frame in which timber boards were placed (the timber boards and steel handrail are now missing). The south-side counterweight wheel is housed in a plate-steel covering at the gantry's southern end.

Suspended below the gantry platform is a timber-decked access platform to four pulley wheels around which a steel lifting cable raises and lowers the adjustable train bridge. The pulley wheels are connected to an upper crane block from which a triangular-shaped steel frame is suspended. The horizontal beam end nodes of this structure are connected to the northern and southern trusses of the adjustable train bridge by a vertical lifting linkage and to the gantry bridge above by steel tension cables, which were adjusted according to the state of the tide.

The adjustable train bridge itself is formed of fabricated steel trusses on its north and south sides with steel beams connecting the top and bottom chords and diagonal bracing between. Its deck structure comprises primary steel beams aligned north-south across the width of the bridge with secondary beams spanning east-west between them. The secondary beams support a series of timber railway sleepers and timber joists above. The deck itself is comprised of timber boards, probably later 20th-century replacements, spanning east-west between the timber joists, with rails running between them. The primary beams are connected to the northern and southern girders via a four-inch-diameter steel pin that allowed the bridge to articulate with the movement of the ferry-boat and tidal conditions.

A pedestrian walkway runs parallel with the south side of the train ferry berth for approximately 40 metres. Accessed from the landside access bridge, it is steel-framed with a timber deck, the steel posts probably driven directly into the London Clay of the intertidal zone. Stairs positioned just over midway along its length give access to the southern berthing arm.

The two berthing arms at the west end of the train ferry berth were not accessible at the time of survey. Both contain mooring bollards. The southern berthing arm, the longer of the two at 130 metres in length, has a navigation light at its west end. The northern berthing arm measures 17 metres in length.

The landside access bridge at the east end of the ferry berth is constructed from reinforced concrete and carries two railway lines across its deck. Its abutment on the seaward side contains a steel hinged pivot bearing that allowed the west end of the adjustable train bridge to articulate vertically up or down.