This post brings to a close my recent series of posts featuring bridges in London. Sadly, unlike the Plashet School Footbridge, I couldn't get permission to visit the interior of this one.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiL7wpch0GHqEzqKHySzQQ51YpzUfw4QgVw4fqb1gVknxeJsJ_LgfFgRRlGZIthMMaUbMvnxuR6Afrv8xGuWgJKL_NRMErosiJg3aolJ5qAko4CIIXcp2pprNQXclTL87DBFdWooRd1FyxT/s200/Aspiration1.jpg)
It was designed by Wilkinson Eyre with Flint and Neill, and is admirably simple in its conception. A square cross-section rotates through 90 degrees from one end to the other, creating a fusilli-like twisted form. The two end portals are not directly opposite each other, and as can be seen from below, the bridge's geometry provides a rational way of dealing with the requirements of a skewed crossing.
Structurally, the primary element is an aluminium box girder, which helps reduce the weight and hence the loads on the supporting buildings. The girder twists in such a way that it is shallowest at its ends (rectangular in cross-section), and deepest at midspan (triangular), as befits the bending moment diagram.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDLFOT_ZdJc2XbCqUsr5O30OEoAqn3EfoAtcBxqRCJtAXYRkDyLr5ef3lSF4cgTj2kDQ0ma6MX12GaUJPuk8Q4zEvy0LwK53vMjFUSb9YqS6q9vDOvqFAEY83c_MqL3V3VpijHXCo239HW/s200/Aspiration3.jpg)
It's a very special bridge, both in how it responds to the geometric needs of the site, and in how the structural form combines the rational with the idiosyncratic. I expect that it's essentially unrepeatable, difficult to imagine it being re-created anywhere else. Judging from the various interior photos I've seen, my exterior photos fail to capture most of what makes it so charming, but even from this perspective, it's a very fine bridge.
Further information:
- Google maps / Bing maps
- Structurae
- Speirs and Major
- New Materials for Modern Footbridges (Firth, Footbridge 2002)
- The Bridge of Aspiration, Covent Garden, UK (Firth, Structural Engineering International, 2006)
- Footbridges (Schlaich and Baus, 2008)
- An Encyclopaedia of Britain's Bridges (McFetrich, 2010)