Battersea Railway Bridge

Battersea Railway Bridge
Battersea Railway Bridge from the south west
Coordinates	51°28′23″N 0°10′45″W / 51.47306°N 0.17917°W / 51.47306; -0.17917
Carries	Railway
Crosses	River Thames
Locale	London, England
Maintained by	Transport for London
Heritage status	Grade II* listed structure
Preceded by	Diamond Jubilee Footbridge (two shared piers - in construction)
Followed by	Battersea Bridge
Characteristics
Design	Arch bridge
Total length	230m (plus approaches)
Width	10.5m
Longest span	42.5m
Clearance below	6m (above MHWS)
History
Opened	2 March 1863; 161 years ago (1863-03-02)
Statistics
Daily traffic	8 scheduled passenger trains per hour (05:45 - 23:30), plus additional unscheduled freight trains
Location

The Battersea Railway Bridge (originally called the Cremorne Bridge, after the riverside public Cremorne Gardens in Chelsea, and formerly commonly referred to as the Battersea New Bridge) is a bridge across the River Thames in London, between Battersea and Fulham. It is used by the West London Line of the London Overground from Clapham Junction to Willesden Junction. Dating from 1863, the bridge is one of the oldest crossings over the Thames in London.^[1]

The bridge's completion provided a connection between the main northbound lines out of Paddington and Euston with the southbound lines of Waterloo, Victoria and Clapham Junction via the West London Extension Railway.^[2] It was originally furnished with both standard gauge and broad gauge tracks; the bridge was exclusively used by freight traffic up until 1904.^[2] It has been refurbished multiple times throughout its operating life. It is presently owned by Network Rail Infrastructure Ltd (who use Chelsea River Bridge as its official name ), and links Battersea to the extreme north-east part of Fulham, known as Chelsea Harbour or Imperial Wharf, a regenerated area on the south side of Chelsea Creek.