Tennison Road Station

In 2014 Network Rail commissioned the replacement of Tennison Road Footbridge. This would turn out to be one of the largest bridge replacement project over the rail network in over a decade and become well-known for its scale and complexity.

Graham Construction were the main contractors who appointed Janson Bridging to assist with the installation and removal of a temporary footbridge during the completion of the new permanent bridge.

Spanning 10 live railway lines wasn’t the only problem here, five of the lines were commuter lines, however five of the lines were linked to the Selhurst Train Depot which operates 24 hours a day, all year round except for Christmas Day and part of Boxing Day. The bridge also carried two main electric feeds for the London Borough or Corydon as well as medium and low pressure gas mains, a water main and telecommunications and highway lighting.

As complex as it sounds, Janson Bridging provided a 55m x 1.8m Panel bridge. This was then adapted by increasing the floor height and installing a fake floor to enable the services to also be diverted over the temporary bridge and to also house the cables for the lighting on the bridge. The installation was completed during a weekend railway possession and then lifted into place over the 10 live railway lines. Additionally, due to the complexity of the installation, there were multiple positions needed for the 1000 tonne mobile crane to lift the two main spans whilst a separate, smaller 250 tonne crane was utilised for the far span on the opposite side.

This enabled Graham Construction to then demolish the old bridge and construct a new bridge in its place.

A weekend possession of 49 hours was booked to remove the temporary bridge and this was completed 8 hours ahead of schedule.