The Store Street Aqueduct in central Manchester, England was built in 1798 by Benjamin Outram on the Ashton Canal. A Grade II* listed building it is built on a skew of 45 degrees across Store Street, and is believed to be the first major aqueduct of its kind in Great Britain and the oldest still in use today.
Generally, where a canal (or later a railway) crossed a road, or vice versa, the road would be diverted to cross at right angles. It had no...
more
The Store Street Aqueduct in central Manchester, England was built in 1798 by Benjamin Outram on the Ashton Canal. A Grade II* listed building it is built on a skew of 45 degrees across Store Street, and is believed to be the first major aqueduct of its kind in Great Britain and the oldest still in use today.
Generally, where a canal (or later a railway) crossed a road, or vice versa, the road would be diverted to cross at right angles. It had not always been acceptable but attempts to build masonry arch bridges at an angle, or "skew" of greater than about 15 degrees, had proved unsatisfactory.
The method up to that time had been to build the voussoir arch with the stone course work parallel to the abutments. This transmitted the load outward from the crown in a straight line to the foundations, parallel to the faces of the arch. If a skew was attempted, it threw the lines of force outside the abutments, leading to weakness in the structure.
William Chapman had partially solved the...
less
