Talk:Maidenhead Railway Bridge

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Bridge widening

I have removed "Subsequently the bridge has been widened", because I think it is not correct. A major rail bridge in Maidenhead was widened - but that was a different bridge, in the town centre. CarolGray 18:26, 8 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I have reverted this - the original version is correct. CarolGray 19:59, 8 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

If you stand under the bridge, you can see the change in brickwork. The fact that the same shape for the arches was followed when widening is a clear testimony to Brunel's design. --Redrose64 (talk) 14:41, 5 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Electrification

Maybe not the place for this question, but did they consider letting trains coast over the bridge? Even that mightn't be necessary if they had pantographs at front and back... Just a thought anyway. LaFoiblesse (talk) 16:42, 04 December 2010 (GMT)

Correct, WP:NOTFORUM. That aside, I assume that you mean that there would be a gap in the catenary.

Overhead catenary is sometimes designed to include dead sections, but (in Britain at least) these always involve a section of catenary that exists, but is not connected to the supply. If there were a gap in the wires, this would almost certainly be significantly longer than the bridge, since if there are to be no wires on the bridge, the wires can't simply stop at one end, and start immediately on the other - there needs to be a run-out stretch, and corresponding run-in stretch, which cannot be shorter than the distance between two overhead masts. Have a look at this picture, which shows that masts can be about two coach lengths apart; and since these particular coaches are about 64 feet (20 m) long, the distance between masts is about 128 feet (39 m). Thus, we are considering a 128 feet (39 m) run-in/run-out length at each end of the bridge, plus the absent catenary over both 128-foot (39 m) spans, for a total of 512 feet (156 m) with no electricity supply. This would therefore be rather unfeasible, particularly for stopping trains, because if an eastbound train had called at Maidenhead (67 chains (1,300 m) to the west), or a westbound train had called at Taplow (62 chains (1,200 m) to the east) the train would need to work up a decent speed to acquire the necessary inertia required coast through such a huge gap.

As for multiple pantographs, this is also unlikely: in Britain, EMUs never have more than one pantograph per unit; locos also have one each nowadays (the first 100 AC electric locos of 1959-64 had two, but one was soon removed from each as unnecessary). As explained above, the two pantographs would need to be at least 512 feet (156 m) apart - any train shorter than around eight coaches would have no chance of maintaining power continuously. Typical stopping trains on this line have 3, 5 or 6 coaches. --Redrose64 (talk) 19:39, 4 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, it's perfectly feasible. Have a look at Akkrum railway station. 400 metres (1,300 ft) north of that station is a 70 metres (230 ft) gap in the overhead wire at a swing bridge, clearly visible in Google Streetview. 3.2 kilometres (2.0 miles) further is another one. There are many gaps like these at moveable bridges in the Netherlands. Thanks to ski-shaped overhead rails, the run-in/run-out stretches are significantly shorter than the standard 70 metres (230 ft) mast-to-mast distance. Of course, power to the motors has to be cut before reaching the end of the wire to prevent arcing, especially as this is DC electrification.

They just don't think it's worth the effort. On the continent many historic railway bridges got wires in the '30s and '50s and nobody thinks they're out of place. In fact, a double track railway without overhead wires, let alone a quadruple track one, seems incomplete to our eyes. PiusImpavidus (talk) 14:30, 11 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

It's a working bridge, not just a thing of great beauty. It was built for the railway and it continues to be used by the railway. As long as it is treated sympathetically (as the equally beautiful and listed St Pancras station was when electrified) the catenary will not have a negative impact. 83.104.249.240 (talk) 16:23, 25 June 2016 (UTC)[reply]

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Number of arches

a single structure of two tall wide red brick arches buttressed by two over-land smaller arches - I was there today, and observed that besides the two main arches, there are three smaller arches at each end, making a total of eight. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 16:30, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]