British Bridges Brushing up on...

Excuse me, sir. Can you tell me anything at all about London Bridge?

Not a lot. No, I'm afraid.

Not a thing. I don't know anything about London Bridge at all.

-Any of London's other bridges?

-Not really.

I know that Tower Bridge goes up and down and that's it.

And thus goes the nation, my friends.

Indifference to British bridges

suddenly as normal as iPods or Pancake Day.

When did that happen?

In a recent official survey that we can probably find somewhere,

it was shown that six out of ten people today

would rather walk across an existing bridge

than spend eight years at college learning how to build one.

Nice going, human race! Welcome to the apathy age.

ROCK MUSIC

It wasn't always like this and it shouldn't be.

Pound for pound, bridges are more interesting

than any creature that has appeared on a David Attenborough programme.

And over the next half an hour, you will be reminded of exactly why that is.

If we fall short, no matter.

It's still a terrific thing to claim.

And reckless, wild longshots are exactly what the history of bridges on television is all about.

We'll begin with the famous Forth Rail Bridge,

which means, of course, this show will never end.

Building on the original Forth Bridge was abandoned

when its architect's previous structure over the Tay fell down.

A public enquiry reported that it was poorly designed,

poorly constructed and poorly maintained.

It was, however, commended for its cheerful blue colour.

Which brings us to the current Forth Bridge and its own paint job.

Two questions. One, exactly how big a job is that?

And two, is this task inherently entertaining?

As far as contemporary news media is concerned,

the public has always wanted Forth Bridge and plenty of it.

It's only because the bridge is painted all the time

that it doesn't get rusty.

The painters work right at the top, nearly 400 feet up.

Can you see one of them in the corner?

This little launch is always fussing around

in case one of the painters falls off the bridge into the river.

The problem is the Forth Bridge is just too big.

Look, see how it dwarfs Scotland on its way to America?

I would say it is quite a superstructure.

Probably 55,000 tonnes of steel.

145 acres.

It needs 17 tonnes of paint a year.

17 tonnes! You may well gasp, my friends.

That is more paint than gets applied to the entire cast of TOWIE in a whole series.

The Forth Bridge behind me is 100 years old on Sunday.

Marvellous piece of engineering.

They've told me to come and spruce it up a bit so I've brought my brush.

Wrong sort of brush, pal, I think you've got there.

-You mean I didn't need this kind of brush at all?

-No.

-You must be Robert MacLaurin.

-I am.

-How do I know?

Robert, one of the painters who regularly comes here,

not with this kind of brush, I suppose.

Oh, I've got it! It's a bit about an artist who PAINTS the Forth Bridge!

Alan's team have told him to pretend to get muddled up! OK, got it.

Amazingly, at the same time as the Titchmarsh was cutting up

on the quayside, no fewer than three other TV crews were

cranking out colour pieces about the bridge.

Filler froth on the Forth was being ladled out from below it,

from above it and here's John Noakes attacking it from within.

There are 20 painters working all the year round

and it takes them four years to paint the bridge from end to end.

And it's always the same reddy-brown colour,

specially mixed to stop the 145 acres of steelwork from rusting.

Blue Peter mimicked the Forth Bridge in that, once one report on it had ended,

-it was time to start another.

-Hold on, Peter.

There's a train coming. Better get down. Hold on a minute.

-HORN SOUNDS

-Whoa!

Perhaps the most well known fact about the Forth Bridge

is that it's always being painted

and I could see evidence of a fresh coat, half applied.

Alistair took me to where a lone painter was defying the elements.

Nearly 5,000 gallons of paint are needed to give it a good coat

and 20 men working full-time take four years to complete the job.

Then it's time for them to start over again.

I was proud to think I'd done a few square feet.

We are literally watching paint dry.

Come and show us how to do it.

And Blue Peter being Blue Peter, the next thing was to show us all

how to build the Forth Bridge in our bedrooms.

I always thought the set designer on Blue Peter

wildly underestimated the size of the programme's studio.

-There's the first one.

-Yes.

And here's the second one.

Those three shelving units don't swell out the frame, do they?

Is this the actual order that the bridge was built?

That's a terrible question, Pete.

They put the cantilevers up first then attach to the riverbank. There were attached here.

I think the mechanic's unattaching us, there.

In a second, Lesley Judd will come on when the man asks for a load.

She has a little joke prepared

but competitive Peter Purves treads all over it.

A complete bridge. All we need is a load. Leslie?

-THEY LAUGH

-Get a load of this! How about that?

-Yeah, thanks, Pete.

-I'll hold it steady.

Sits down very gently, is it? I don't want to hurt you.

Looking at John Noakes' armpits there,

I'm surprised Lesley Judd doesn't fall down.

Then again, it has to be said that the Forth Bridge will always

be fascinating, just because it will never be finished.

Its never-ending cycle of maintenance and rebirth

is somehow symbolic of man's restless searching for perfection.

A TV saga that can never end for no-one can ever say,

"Yes, we have finally finished it. The Forth Bridge is now painted."

-The Forth Bridge is now painted.

-Oh, well, fair enough.

Did you notice, though, most of those breezy reports were interchangeable,

competent but identikit reporting.

And that's because programmes about bridges are not very interesting.

No.

To elevate such base metal,

you really have to try something different.

Hundreds of years ago, when people wanted to cross the river,

they hunted for big, flat stones and piled them up.

Then they placed even larger stones across the top to make a bridge.

These children are sitting on one of the very oldest bridges in the world.

-It's at a place called...

-Midwich, the Village of the Damned!

Have you ever seen such huge stones?

Such ominous, foreboding stones?

Stones that seem to ache with sombre, ancient secrets.

They're called clappers

and this kind of thing is called a clapper bridge.

The unsettling tone of this particular 1966 look at bridges didn't end there.

-In fact...

-Joan! Joan! Psst!

Other way round, Joan. We've changed the shot!

Joan! Joan! Turn round!

Hello. Did you notice what a different kind of bridge that was?

Let's have another look at it.

UNSETTLING MUSIC

People used to believe that the river gods would only allow a bridge

to be built if it was paid for by a life.

There are stories of the Devil building bridges

and demanding in payment the life of a human being.

Sir, you made me jump.

Holy Father, not a sound of your footsteps did I hear.

How could you, with the winds reaching and the river foaming?

-But you seem distressed.

-It's my cow. She is all I have.

She's across the other side of the river

and the Lord only knows how she got there. What shall I do?

-All you need is a bridge.

-All I need is a bridge!

Stick with this, bridge lovers. It is relevant, I assure you.

Trust me, go without looking back.

Go to your home and close your door.

-And then?

-Then you shall have your bridge.

Over that roaring torrent, to cross wherever I like? But how?

Be fair, our two leads here are mumming fit to burst,

making the best of some pretty threadbare dialogue.

The price is but one life, the first across it. Say no more.

Close your door and stay inside until I call.

MUSIC: "London Bridge Is Falling Down"

No foolin', this really was a school programme about bridge building,

though I grant you the director seems to be under the impression he's making the Wicker Man.

Some of it was on message.

Each of these ones has a French name.

It's called a voussoir.

Can you say that word? Voussoir.

This block, or stone, goes at the very top of the arch.

I painted it a different colour so that you can see it easily.

It's called the keystone.

Now we've made an arch.

I think you've made a secret Masonic Lodge.

Would you like to learn the secret?

DRAMATIC MUSIC

There's the first living thing to cross it!

You cunning old woman!

Your scraggy cur is no use to me! It was a human life!

Your miserable soul I wanted!

Bold broadcasting for sure, although you can't help wondering

if a generation of kids left school believing

Isambard Kingdom Brunel was the Witchfinder General.

And incredibly, that's not even as terrifying as architectural transmissions get.

Brunel's bridge is also a suspension bridge.

If you look, there's the railway part is suspended

underneath those flat, grey bits there.

But, and no-one knows why, Brunel didn't tie his towers back.

Instead, he used those great big tubular metal things

to push them apart.

Professor Clarkson there, using the phrases "those flat, grey bits"

and "great big tubular metal things"

to describe the work of the greatest engineers this country has ever known.

And by the way, it is pronounced "Is-ambard".

I-sambard Kingdom Brunel is the engineer's hero.

He remained a towering figure, a visionary.

A man who built for his own time but also for the future.

For him, nothing was impossible.

Impressive shot, this,

though the temptation for the camera team to go off to the pub

and leave him screeching off the bridge for no reason

must have been huge.

-Clifton Suspension Bridge.

-Oh, you say "bridge", do you?

I say brI-dge!

It is a visual feast of an erection, a steel "eye-span", if you will.

# All around my hat... #

And there are many ways to enjoy it.

Convention dictates one simply travels across it

but others can see what Brunel really intended.

There is a fair breeze that blows up the gorge.

Up the gorge. There is, yes.

Look at the boat chugging up there.

HORN SOUNDS

Then it started raining.

This tower is different than that one in a few subtle ways.

-They look identical to me.

-Three big differences. I'll give you one.

-The sides of this one are scooped out by these arches.

-Yeah.

But they're solid in that one. OK? That's just one difference. Two more.

I don't think there was a second date.

But there's one really clear difference.

If I slapped the corner and gave you a clue.

And what about that one?

Oh, yeah, I can see...

Look, she even did her nails as well.

-That was great. Lucy?

-That was awesome.

I think she's faking that. After all, men do seem to see

something in bridgework that possibly women don't.

The weather is something, which enormously improves bridges.

-Good weather, that is.

-Yes.

I think even an unattractive bridge

can look quite nice in good lighting.

In the same way as a not-very-attractive woman

can look better in candlelight.

Well, if you say so, Reg.

And as with women, so with bridges.

At night-time, bedecked in a glitter of jewellery,

there's a special allure.

Be aware, we haven't added this music.

SOFT JAZZ

A time, too, for sailors to start thinking of bed.

Provocative stuff, although before all bridges

start thinking they can get any man they want...

Surely it's not just the leaden skies that make the popular

Chelsea Bridge seem rather dull.

It's painted in a half-hearted Jubilee red, white and blue,

the colours muted as if to reflect the prevailing mood

of economic restraint and not to offend any touring gnomes of Zurich.

After Hammersmith and Albert Bridge, it's a disappointment.

Wow! Ouch! He ripped that crossing a new pothole!

We couldn't avoid glancing at Kew Railway Bridge.

A structure of no artistic and little engineering merit which,

adding insult to injury,

perversely carries underground trains over the river.

I've heard about Crossrail but he's absolutely livid!

And darlings, this wasp-tongued wielder of the transpontine taunt isn't done yet.

If Hungerford Bridge, which takes the trains to Charing Cross,

isn't deeply ashamed of itself, it ought to be.

It's literally a bastard of a bridge.

What's worse, it effectively destroys the finest sweep of the Thames.

POW! The Simon Cowell of the swinging suspension.

The British Army needed him on the River Kwai.

The Japanese would've surrendered in five minutes.

Of course, being aesthetically aloof is all very well

for documentary makers, but for those whose living is made

under and around bridges have a very different perspective.

And while possibly not as erudite, have just as much to say.

This is Harry Rogers, the coracle man of Ironbridge.

What he's carrying here,

while it may look like something that would set the catwalk alight

during London Fashion Week, is his working coracle.

She is known all over the world, the bridge is.

Better than what I am!

On the Ironbridge, 100 foot across it, 50 foot span, 50 foot high.

Supposed to be, look, but there's no nuts and bolts in it.

There are doubters but I say there is.

200 nuts and bolts in the bridge when it was first erected.

Now that's something to go in the book.

Cos don't know much about it, isn't it.

He ended that outburst with "innit".

Yup, we all talk like Harry nowadays, up to a point.

We've been making coracles, me and my ancestors, for 300 year.

And all the wood we making it with, like,

we get it from the timber yard.

Ash.

Local dialect. What they lack in audio, they make up for in heart.

And this subject needs all the presenting soul it can get.

Here at Wroxeter, five miles east of Shrewsbury,

the Romans built the first bridge that ever spanned the River Severn.

It lay on the original line of the Watling Street

and they chose this spot because it is one of the few

parts of the Severn Valley in this area that is free from flooding.

OK, Hubert. We've got that one in the can.

For insurance, can we do another take?

This time have a bit of fun with it. Be a bit silly if you want.

Here at Wroxeter, five miles east of Shrewsbury,

the Romans built the first bridge that ever spanned the River Severn.

It lay on the original line of the Watling Street

and they chose this spot because it is one of the few

parts of the Severn Valley in this area that is free from flooding.

OK, better. That was great.

Sets us up brilliantly for the next section actually,

because, you know, bridges are fun, aren't they?

This is Christopher Robin, alias Christopher Milne,

whose childhood play inspired his father to create Winnie the Pooh.

Today he was back on the little wooden bridge

at Hartfield in East Sussex where he used to throw sticks

and see which one floated downstream quickest.

And thus the international juggernaut of Poohsticks was born.

Christopher himself has earned nothing from the sport but memories.

I know what Tigger would have been doing! My goodness, yes.

He would have been pushing you, a lot of you, into the river.

And Kanga and Roo?

Kanga and Roo, no.

I didn't quite know what they would have been doing.

Pooh, of course, would have been sitting under a tree stump

and an appropriate hum would have been working its way up to the surface.

"A little heads-up on that Kanga and Roo question next time, hey?

"Poohsticks Features requires some pre-production, you know?"

There we are. I've got one for Shep and one for you.

Now, who else hasn't got a Poohstick? Anyone still needing one? Right.

HORN SOUNDS

Come on, to the finishing post, you lot.

SHOUTS OF ENCOURAGEMENT

David Bellamy, whose attack and energy levels

in any item can make, well, BBC Three look like BBC Four.

If he was allowed to front Mega Poohsticks Live,

Sky would've snapped it up for millions years ago.

Where is it? That's gonna be the one! Catch it!

What does it say?

-It's Shep!

-It's Shep!

CHEERING

Indeed, most bridge-based contests

remain curiously ignored by the networks.

This one is typical.

People are asked to get from one place to another using

a flimsy framework made entirely of lightweight sticks

and pieces of string.

In many ways, it's the sporting parallel of breakfast television.

It's all just an exercise anyway

because that river isn't actually very deep.

Well, it wasn't when they recceed it during the drought.

Then, of course, there's these nuisances,

people who think they can fly.

This man may be an exception but there's every chance

that here is another wilful eccentric hooked on attention.

What went wrong?

In his post-flop analysis, even the interviewer,

Prime Minister David Cameron, has trouble staying focused.

I'll have another go later on.

Then there are the students.

Despite high railings and warnings by the authorities,

over 100 people jumped into the shallow waters.

It was fantastic. The water is really shallow but it was great.

And there's, like, kind of people with diving equipment

that go and save you if anything happens.

We thought it was quite shallow

-but we didn't realise quite how shallow it was.

-He did.

12 people were taken to hospital, mainly with fractures.

Cheer up, chum.

All the best thrills should come with a little added peril.

May we present the astonishing Blokes Building the Tyne Bridge.

MUSIC: "Ride Of The Valkyries" by Wilhelm Richard Wagner

This was when Britain really had got talent.

He's probably on the outside of about eight pints of Newcastle Brown, too. Bravo!

Oh, I was enjoying that.

Still, this looks like fun.

Or at least local TV's hangdog approximation of it.

The self-styled King of Hay is Richard Booth,

owner of the world's largest second-hand bookshop.

Richard Coeur de Livre even has his own Crown Jewels set in copper.

His sceptre a burnished gas pipe, his orb, an old ballcock.

I don't know, he doesn't look entirely at ease to me.

I suspect TV producers have persuaded this poor chap

to get behind their concept and shove.

Hay is surrounded by three bridges

and this is probably our most important bridge.

Ladies and gentlemen, Ben Elton.

Bringing horses in and I think as a handsome border post

where we could issue passports and all that kind of thing,

I think this is the best of all three bridges.

Now this bloke's got it right.

If ever I win the lottery,

this is exactly how I'll travel everywhere.

We are celebrating the 200th anniversary

of the world's first cast-iron bridge.

As an American, I've come to this English valley

in a year of celebration to share experiences, present and past.

BRASS BAND PLAYS

Ladies and gentlemen, the unique sight of a brass band playing in the middle of a bridge

and being presented to our American friends

as a Great British tradition.

Now we seem to have drifted from having fun with bridges

to having fun with our cousins from across the pond.

They love our priceless heritage and so do we.

In fact, we love our priceless heritage so much,

we are willing to sell it to them if the price is right.

Remember London Bridge? They bought that.

They thought they were getting Tower Bridge, didn't they? Didn't they?

Do you know what happened to London Bridge?

It wasn't stolen. It was sold, knocked to pieces

and all the pieces were taken across the Atlantic to America...

# Where they built it up in Arizona Arizona, Arizona

# They built it up in Arizona my fair lady... #

The arrival of London Bridge in Arizona

certainly had its fair share of fanfare.

All manner of corny, out-of-work English performers piled in to offer the Yanks

a ridiculous image of British life

and thus softened them up for Downton Abbey.

The bridge itself is now hollow

so the leftovers make up thousands of souvenir pieces,

each and every piece authenticated with

the signature of the city of London engineer, reproduced on all items.

There is a clock, the most expensive item,

selling at about £22 with chippings of bridge set in the acrylic.

Fragments of history for sale and from the way they are selling,

it appears the Americans are determined to have the whole

of the bridge because most of these are being bought by Americans.

See, we like to think of people stateside being a little slow

with our jokes. No irony, we say.

This despite them having given us Woody Allen, Steve Martin,

the Simpsons, WC Fields, Tina Fey and Seinfeld, to name a few.

So how we laughed when we tricked them

into buying the wrong London Bridge.

Here's the news confirming it.

They bought the wrong bridge, of course.

They thought they were getting Tower Bridge and were a little

surprised when the more classical lines of London Bridge took shape.

Except that's a myth.

Quite a lot of people seem to think that Tower Bridge is actually London Bridge, don't they?

That is particularly true in America because when I sold London Bridge

to America in 1968,

many people thought that Tower Bridge was London Bridge.

They thought they were going to get Tower Bridge?

Yes but the people I sold it to, McCulloch Corporation Los Angeles,

they knew what they were buying.

There you go, they didn't even want this one.

So Russia, what are we bid?

Now, I grew up near Tower Bridge

and even I always thought it was hundreds of years old.

I had no idea it's actually a contemporary of the motorcar.

In fact, it has always been receptive to modern technology.

That's the lever, which raises and lowers Tower Bridge

and immediately behind that there is a box of special equipment

that we've had imported, if you like, for this occasion

and above that is the telephone.

OK. Those tones tell me I've got through.

What I've got to do now is enter a security code

so all that equipment out there knows that it's me.

The Kieran Prendiville.

And those tones confirm that now I really do have total control

over the raising of Tower Bridge.

And all I've got to do now

is to press the digit one on this telephone.

That lever will move and Tower Bridge will open. Here goes.

Whoops! Wrong number!

CRASH

Just kidding.

Wonderful! There goes the lever.

And there's Tower Bridge!

Not a perfect system but better than the teams of turtles

that previously had to haul the thing open.

In the 1930s, these unreliable reptiles left the bridge ajar

as a double-decker bus thundered across. True story!

Congratulations, too, for 46-year-old London bus driver Albert Gunter,

who, when faced with a widening gap

while crossing Tower Bridge, jumped his best to safety.

At London Transport headquarters he received a £10 reward

for averting a serious disaster and when asked

-how he'd spend it replied...

-Five for me and five for the missus!

That might seem meagre reward for averting catastrophe but remember,

£10 in 1937 would be worth, what, £12.75 today.

And for these hard-working sons of toil,

just two quid of that would buy you a holiday.

Albeit a holiday to Tower Bridge.

It might be any seaside beach...

Yep, at one time,

the Thames at low tide was like Baywatch in Bermondsey.

This kid's made a sand pear.

I think they imported the sand from Southend or somewhere like that

and they used to bring truckloads up the river on the barges

and spread it on the sand, you know.

And where there's a holiday, there's a holiday romance.

I had my first date on Tower Bridge. It was a boy from school.

He said, "Where shall I meet you?"

I thought, "First date, I'll go on Tower Bridge."

I love Tower Bridge.

So I met him up there and he come along,

strolling along with a trilby hat on what he buyed off his brother

and come up, "Hello," like Jack the Lad so of course,

we didn't kiss or anything because if you kiss, they thought you

was going to have a baby because the parents never told you anything.

A wonderful story, though she's remembering it slightly wrong.

It wasn't a trilby, it was a flat cap and I bought it specially.

Sadly, with the lure of foreign travel,

the days of Tower Bridge as a romantic holiday retreat

were soon numbered.

That said, some package tour operators

did still fly there up till 1955.

That's all over now.

You know, some might argue that the entire golden age of bridges

is all over, that all our rivers are now crossed,

all our transpontine needs are now sated.

It's as if we British have looked the Sound Of Music in the eye

and said, "OK. We've climbed every mountain,

"we've forded every stream. Now what?"

Today we simply take our bridges for granted

and it's only when we find ourselves absentmindedly

up to our ears in water that we miss their comforting permanence.

Tonight, I hope we've reminded you of just how wonderful they are.

By turns romantic and challenging, impressive and dangerous,

ancient and modern.

And if at any point we've also shown them

to be a little bit frightening, don't have nightmares.

Actually, on second thoughts, do.

MUSIC: "London Bridge Is Falling Down"

You cunning old woman! Your scraggy cur is no use to me!

It was a human life, your miserable soul I wanted!

Good night. May the river gods be with you.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd