Description

Grainger & Miller, 1842. 8-span, segemental-arch railway viaduct for Edinburgh and Glasgow Railway, over Red Burn at Castlecary. 177.8m long arcade between E and W abutments, 8 arches each spanning 15.2m; 8.1m wide between parapets; highest soffit 26.9m above water. Channelled and stugged ashlar piers with projecting, polished ashlar plain entablature; raised, channelled and polished square voussoirs to arches; channelled and stugged abutment. Projecting cornice at rail level; simple roll-moulding detail. Coursed, broached ashlar parapet above with rectangular coping; 20th century steel railing to parapet head. Large, stugged ashlar abutment walls to E and W with full-height rectangular pilaster buttresses at springing point of arcade; coursed, broached ashlar with rectangular sunken detailing. Additional reinforcement to arches; cast-iron railway sleepers bolted to N and S abutments, tied together along soffit.

Statement of Interest

The Red Burn Viaduct is an instantly recognisable landmark in Central Scotland. It remains in constant use on the main train line between Edinburgh and Glasgow, and also spans over the busy A80 road between Stirling and Glasgow. The Antonine Wall and Forth and Clyde canal (SCHEDULED ANCIENT MONUMENTS) run almost exactly parallel with the line of the Red Burn Viaduct, and since its construction, the Red Burn Viaduct has remained a vital transport link in this strategic location, the shortest and most negotiable spanning point across Central Scotland. The designers of Red Burn, Grainger and Miller, were also responsible for the Avon Viaduct (1838, A-listed, see separate listing), another greatly engineered viaduct on the Glasgow and Edinburgh Railway. This viaduct, to the W of Linlithgow, is of a similar style to Red Burn but boasts a massive 23-span arcade.

The Red Burn Viaduct lies within the amenity zone for the Antonine Wall recommended in D N Skinner The Countryside of the Antonine Wall (1973), and which will form the basis of the buffer zone, yet to be defined, for the proposed Antonine Wall World Heritage Site.

External Links

• Historic Environment Scotland Listing
• Wikidata Q17816402

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

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