The Severn Bridge (Welsh: Pont Hafren) is a motorway suspension bridge spanning the River Severn and River Wye between Aust, South Gloucestershire (just north of Bristol) in England, and Chepstow, Monmouthshire in South Wales, via Beachley, Gloucestershire, a peninsula between the two rivers. It is the original Severn road crossing between England and Wales and took five years to construct at a cost of £8 million. It replaced the Aust ferry.
The bridge was opened on 8 September 1966, by Queen Elizabeth II, who hailed it as the dawn of a new economic era for South Wales. The bridge was granted Grade I listed status on 26 November 1999.
Read more about Severn Bridge: History, Component Structures, Post-construction Changes, Tolls, Ownership, 40 Year Inspections, Simultaneous Closures in 2009
Famous quotes containing the words severn and/or bridge:
“Before the Roman came to Rye or out to Severn strode,
The rolling English drunkard made the rolling English road.”
—Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874–1936)
“Oh, who will now be able to relate how Pantagruel behaved in face of these three hundred giants! Oh my muse, my Calliope, my Thalie, inspire me now, restore my spirits, because here is the ass’s bridge of logic, here is the pitfall, here is the difficulty of being able to describe the horrible battle undertaken.”
—François Rabelais (1494–1553)