The Rolling Bridge

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For the Victorian-era retractable bridge, see Guthrie rolling bridge.

Curling bridge

Half uncurled
Ancestor	truss bridge
Related	None
Descendant	none
Carries	Pedestrians
Span range	short
Material	Triangular steel segments, hydraulic actuators, lightweight deck
Movable	Yes
Design effort	high
Falsework required	No

The Rolling Bridge (also known as a "curling bridge"), is a new moveable bridge, built in 2004 as part of the Grand Union Canal office & retail development project at Paddington Basin, London.

The bridge was conceived by British designer Thomas Heatherwick, designed by SKM Anthony Hunt with Packman Lucas, and built by Littlehampton Welding Ltd.

This bridge consists of eight triangular sections hinged at the walkway level and connected above by two part links that may be collapsed toward the deck by hydraulic pistons, which are concealed in vertical posts in the bridge parapets. When extended, it resembles a conventional steel and timber footbridge, and is 12 metres long. However, to allow the passage of boats, the bridge can be made to curl up until its two ends touch, to form an octagonal shape measuring one half of the waterway's width at that point.

The Rolling Bridge is curled up every Friday at noon.

In 2005, the bridge won the British Structural Steel Design Award [1].

[edit] "Rolling" as a name and as a type

While its designer refers to this particular structure as the "The Rolling Bridge" on his website,[2] this should probably be regarded as the name for this particular bridge rather than a term to refer to its type, which could be more accurately described as a "curling bridge" (this name is used by some[3] to refer to this bridge). At present, this curling bridge is the only one of its type known to be in existence.

Traditional use of the term "rolling bridge" dates from at least the Victorian era, and is used to describe a type of retractable drawbridge used to span a ditch or moat surrounding a fortification. That type of bridge is not hinged, and remains horizontal when it is rolled inside the gates of a fort.[4] One particular version of the rolling bridge type was known as the Guthrie rolling bridge, examples of which may still be seen at Fort Nelson, Portsmouth.