McMillans Bridge

McMillans Bridge, is a riveted wrought iron open web truss bridge, located over the Woady Yaloak River on the Rokewood-Skipton Road between Rokewood and Werneth on a historical route between Geelong and the 1850s goldfields at Ararat and Streatham.

McMillans bridge
Coordinates38.01667°N 143.96667°E / 38.01667; 143.96667
Carries[C143] Rokewood-Skipton Road
CrossesWoady Yaloak River
LocaleRokewood, Victoria, Australia
Characteristics
DesignWrought Iron open web truss
Total length30 metres (98 ft 5 in)
Width6.1 metres (20 ft 0 in)
Longest span29 metres (95 ft 2 in)[1]
History
Opened1856; 1889 (reconstructed spans)

McMillans Bridge was originally constructed in 1856 with stone abutments and timber truss, by the Victorian Central Road Board to a design of Charles Rowland, a student of prominent colonial engineer David Lennox.[2] In 1888-9 the timber span was replaced with a riveted wrought iron truss designed be Charles Anthony Corbett Wilson by for the Shires of Leigh and Grenville. Wilson was a particularly prolific Victorian shire engineer who was influenced in this and Pitfield Bridge by the lightweight and efficient metal truss designs of Professor W. C. Kernot of Melbourne University.[3]

The 1889 wrought-iron spans were fabricated in Geelong at the Humble and Nicholson Vulcan Foundry and comprise two double-intersection deck-trusses, connected by iron cross bracing, and seated on the 1856 abutments of red sandstone. These abutments were originally made for a timber truss superstructure, which lasted only 33 years. The timber deck has a single layer of longitudinal planking on timber cross beams, which are bolted to the flanges of the truss top chords. The single span is 29 metres long with a deck 6.1 metres wide, later widened to 7.3 metres. The wrought-iron lattice-girder trusses are of unusually light construction.[2]

The Bridge is listed on the Victorian Heritage Register.[2]

References
  1. National Trust Register citation B3263
  2. "McMillans Bridge (H1847)". Victorian Heritage Register. Heritage Victoria. Retrieved 7 July 2014.
  3. Alsop, P. F. B, 1999, A History of McMillans Bridge over Mt Misery Creek on the Rokewood-Skipton Road in the Shires of Leigh and Grenville Victoria
Notes
  • Colin O'Connor, Spanning Two Centuries, Historic Bridges of Australia. University of Queensland Press, 1985. p. 103


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