THE number of bridges unable to carry the heaviest vehicles on Britain’s roads has risen for the second year running, new figures show.
Local authorities identified 3,211 bridges as being substandard at the end of last year, the RAC Foundation said.
That is up 3.4 per cent on the total of 3,105 in 2020, and up 5.1 per cent on the figure of 3,055 in 2019.
Many of these bridges are subject to weight restrictions, while others are under programmes of increased monitoring or even managed decline.
Councils reported that 17 bridges fully collapsed during the previous 12 months, with five of these in Denbighshire.
Four of these in the county have since been repaired.
A spokesperson for Denbighshire County Council said: “During the last two winters three serious storms in Denbighshire have affected highway structures including bridges.
“Pont Llannerch was washed away during Storm Christoph in 2021.
"Following informal discussions with Natural Resources Wales and a period of public engagement, the council’s cabinet met and resolved to support in principle the replacement of Llannerch Bridge, subject to the securing of necessary funding.
“The council is funding the initial cost of ground surveys and other specialist work which will then enable the council to build a business case and bid for external funding to design and construct a replacement bridge.
“In 2021 there were collapses of four culverts at Cernefyd, Cae Serwyd, Fron Parc and Sowrach, which were completely replaced and are now open.”
MORE: Denbighshire council update on bridge
In addition to the 12 collapsed bridges, a further 37 had partially collapsed, with many of these relatively short structures.
Devon has the highest number of substandard bridges at 229, followed by Oxfordshire (222), Essex (167), Somerset (128) and Cornwall (124).
Some are substandard because they were built to earlier design standards, while others have deteriorated through age and use.
Between them, local authorities say they would ideally want to bring 2,374 of the 3,105 substandard bridges back up to full carrying capacity.
But budget constraints mean they anticipate that only 379 will have the necessary work carried out on them within the next five years.
The analysis was based on data provided by 196 councils in response to freedom of information requests, and was carried out in partnership with Adept, a group representing local authority bosses responsible for transport and other sectors.
RAC Foundation director Steve Gooding said: “Bridges, as defined by highway engineers, come in all shapes and sizes, from soaring structures that span rivers and cross estuaries, through the many modest bridges designed centuries ago for the horse and cart, right down to those that are little more than culverts carrying water under a carriageway.
“But even the failure of the shortest of these structures could mean a five-foot long gap in the carriageway, and even on relatively minor roads that can still be a headache, causing disruption and possibly a long diversion.
“What the data suggests is that councils have been fighting to hold their ground over the last five years.
“Whilst the increase in substandard bridges year-on-year is not huge the picture over the last five years looks more like flatlining than sustained improvement, and with the threat of more severe weather events linked to climate change that must be a worry for the overall resilience of our highway network.”
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