TOWER BRIDGE

Ana del Castillo Flores

HISTORY In the second half of 19th century there

was a big commercial development in

London.

They had to build a new bridge

They decided to build a bascule bridge.

In 1884, a design submitted by Sir Horace Jones was approved.

A NEWS The 12th of January 1953, Time Magazine

published a story that took place in the Tower

Bridge. A red bus of two levels was going to

cross the bridge when suddenly the bascules

began to rise. The driver didn’t stop, and he

thought that the best idea was to accelerate;

they jumped for a little while and finally landed

on the other side, fortunately no one was hurt.

CONSTRUCTIONConstruction started in 1886 and it

took eight years.

When the Tower Bridge was built, it

was the longest bridge of the world.

The bridge has two towers of 65 meters each one, a total length of 244 meters and a distance between towers of 61 meters.

The bascules used to work with big steam machines but nowadays they work with electricity

OPENING The bridge was officially opened on 30 June

1894 by the Prince of Wales.

TRAFFICRoad

The Tower Bridge is crossed by more than 40,000

people everyday

River

The bascules are raised about 1,000 times per

year

River traffic has priority over the road traffic

It is necessary a 24 hours’ notice to open the

bridge.

LONDON 2012 OLYMPICS AND

PARALYMPICS

In June 2012 a set of Olympic rings was

suspended from the bridge to mark that

there was one month left before the start of

the games.

CRÈDITS Ana Del Castillo Flores Maria Clara Calvo Llengua Anglesa 4t C