Excuses, excuses over closure

FOR Bristol Corporation to claim that Bridge Valley Road will remain closed indefinitely due to problems found to be “more complex due to the presence of the railway tunnel, and an ‘old fault line’ in the rock” is ingenuous to put it mildly.

The existence of the railway tunnel is not a new discovery. It has been there for many years – the Port and Pier Railway from Hotwells to Avonmouth – more or less since the days of the broad gauge.

Similarly to claim a problem due to an “old fault line” is also fatuous – the dipping strata of the whole of the Avon Gorge (it is not a “fault” but the dip slope of an anticline – one of the many corrugations forced into the previously horizontal strata of southern England by the compression from the African plate coming into collision with the European one).

It extends right around to beyond the Bristol Royal Infirmary and has been common knowledge since the beginnings of the British Geological Survey.

This was taken into consideration when the Suspension Bridge was built, and more lately when the latest phases of the BRI were planned and constructed, with extensive rock-bolting to stabilise this weak strata. Many areas of this southern face were disturbed by the Second Worl War bombing of Bristol, eg the QEH school building on Jacob’s Wells actually splitting into two from the heavy vibration, with the southern half slipping down the slope visibly.

Bristol Corporation is just using “smoke and mirrors” to cover its inefficiency and inability to get anything done to budget and on time.

David E. Hockin B.A.(Hons), LBIPP, Portishead.