Aqueduct In Harptree Combe

The following building shall be added to the list:

ST 55 NE EAST HARPTREE HARPTREE COMBE

5/110 Aqueduct in Harptree Combe II

Aqueduct for Bristol water supply. Completed 1851, John Simpson, Engineer. Wrought iron tube, limestone piers and abutments. A run of c 5Om of wrought iron pipe of ovoid section cl.4m deep and lm at its widest, carried across a narrow, steep-sided course on 5 piers in coursed rock-faced masonry, tapered square, to stone padstones carrying rocker bearings for the large pipe. Piers vary in height to accommodate ground profile and the central pier is cruciform, with raking buttresses. At the north end is a short length of lofty revetment wall to a stone coping, and at the south end a similar high wall, returned in a battered length formed in undressed rocks, but with three broad raking buttresses in dressed stone; this continues, at a lower level, as an undressed rock revetment battered wall, with stone coping, dying out to rising ground, continued for an overall length of c 25m, and enclosing a reservoir in puddled clay. The pipeline, still in use, is part of an 18km supply line (see also Winford CP), and probably the oldest surviving example of such engineering. It is complete in detail as built.

Listing NGR: ST5618356009