The Gypsey Race is Bridlingtons main river. I've known about its culverts since I started visiting family in the area a few years ago but heard that it just goes under a few buildings and into the harbour. It bugged me though, especially as the infall was brick and the culvert would be under an old part of town. I hadn't seen the outfall at the time either and didn't know where exactly it entered the harbour.
The landscape around the river has changed a lot over the years with several houses along Hilderthorpe Road that backed on to the river recently being demolished. None of these ever culverted over the river though. Construction Work will continue for a while longer yet as a new bridge is being constructed over the river at Palace Avenue (formally Beck Hill) and the marina, where the river outfalls, will be among other areas of Brid to eventually get redeveloped
Eventually curiosity got the better of me so I decided to have a look at all of the culverts along the Gypsey Race starting at B&Q.
Heading upstream here, a 5ft by 12ft concrete box culvert goes under B&Q until it reaches the railway bridge just over 100m away. It's quite deep and heavily silted in places, so no photo's I'm afraid. I assume it was constructed in the late 80's when the store was built as according to the older maps I looked at this part had never been culverted before.
Heading downstream towards town from B&Q I passed under a few bridges and arrived at this. A quick look around the top and I found the way in.
Once inside it revealed itself to be a Corrugated Metal Pipe approximately 6ft x 9ft. This old access shaft and a concrete pipe dropping in from above were the only 'features' along its length. In some places it was just above knee deep, heavily silted and littered with all sorts of rubbish and rubble that had been washed down. In others it was fairly clean with just a trickle running through and the going was easy
This culvert ended after a few hundred meters at an old railway bridge that used to carry a small line over towards the harbour. Just downstream from here is a fairly large concrete pipe behind a grated grill that I suspect is an outfall for the surface water run off from the nearby tesco car park - I spotted it while driving along Springfield Avenue but didn't check it!
Next I came to a new bridge that's being constructed across the river to provide better access to Beck Hill and the town centre from Hilderthorpe Road
The culverts that I was looking forward to started soon after this house, constructed some time around the 1980's (at a guess)
There used to be a much larger Mill Pond here in the mid 19th Century, before the culverts were built. The culvert began as a 5ft brick arch with a nice brick base under an older but still fairly modern house
It soon changed to concrete and corrugated metal again as it ran under different properties (looking back upstream)
And then brick again as it approached what used to be called Clough's Bridge. I've not been able to find out when it was built only that it's on an 1854 map of the town. When it was widened in 1902 the road name changed to Bridge Street, This bridge is completely covered over now but sits between the houses either side of Bridge Street near where The Gift Box shop is. The river is tidal here as can be seen by the tide marks on the box culvert ahead and you can also just make out the grill visible topside from the harbour
Turning around and this is looking back upstream to the newer widened part of the bridge. The bottom part has changed from brick to stone blocks but other than that its much the same as the older half in terms of size and shape. The cast iron pipe just takes surface water and the grill below is likely an overflow for it.
The last 10m of culvert had been below an old storage room. I jumped up to take a look as I could see a door
Unfortunately it was locked but I wondered what the room was ever used for.
Looking the other way
The bridge from the room
Quite disappointed with this pic of the whole thing but it kinda shows the scale of it.
This outfalls 100m or so further on, underneath the boat hoist. It was already 4ft deep at this point but only a few hours past high tide. During the day I went to see if I could see the outfall, now I knew where it was. Again it was only a couple of hours past high tide so I wasn't expecting much but I could just see the top of the box. Presumably at low or very low tides you can walk right in
Hope yer liked it thanks for lookin...
The landscape around the river has changed a lot over the years with several houses along Hilderthorpe Road that backed on to the river recently being demolished. None of these ever culverted over the river though. Construction Work will continue for a while longer yet as a new bridge is being constructed over the river at Palace Avenue (formally Beck Hill) and the marina, where the river outfalls, will be among other areas of Brid to eventually get redeveloped
Eventually curiosity got the better of me so I decided to have a look at all of the culverts along the Gypsey Race starting at B&Q.
Heading upstream here, a 5ft by 12ft concrete box culvert goes under B&Q until it reaches the railway bridge just over 100m away. It's quite deep and heavily silted in places, so no photo's I'm afraid. I assume it was constructed in the late 80's when the store was built as according to the older maps I looked at this part had never been culverted before.
Heading downstream towards town from B&Q I passed under a few bridges and arrived at this. A quick look around the top and I found the way in.
Once inside it revealed itself to be a Corrugated Metal Pipe approximately 6ft x 9ft. This old access shaft and a concrete pipe dropping in from above were the only 'features' along its length. In some places it was just above knee deep, heavily silted and littered with all sorts of rubbish and rubble that had been washed down. In others it was fairly clean with just a trickle running through and the going was easy
This culvert ended after a few hundred meters at an old railway bridge that used to carry a small line over towards the harbour. Just downstream from here is a fairly large concrete pipe behind a grated grill that I suspect is an outfall for the surface water run off from the nearby tesco car park - I spotted it while driving along Springfield Avenue but didn't check it!
Next I came to a new bridge that's being constructed across the river to provide better access to Beck Hill and the town centre from Hilderthorpe Road
The culverts that I was looking forward to started soon after this house, constructed some time around the 1980's (at a guess)
There used to be a much larger Mill Pond here in the mid 19th Century, before the culverts were built. The culvert began as a 5ft brick arch with a nice brick base under an older but still fairly modern house
It soon changed to concrete and corrugated metal again as it ran under different properties (looking back upstream)
And then brick again as it approached what used to be called Clough's Bridge. I've not been able to find out when it was built only that it's on an 1854 map of the town. When it was widened in 1902 the road name changed to Bridge Street, This bridge is completely covered over now but sits between the houses either side of Bridge Street near where The Gift Box shop is. The river is tidal here as can be seen by the tide marks on the box culvert ahead and you can also just make out the grill visible topside from the harbour
Turning around and this is looking back upstream to the newer widened part of the bridge. The bottom part has changed from brick to stone blocks but other than that its much the same as the older half in terms of size and shape. The cast iron pipe just takes surface water and the grill below is likely an overflow for it.
The last 10m of culvert had been below an old storage room. I jumped up to take a look as I could see a door
Unfortunately it was locked but I wondered what the room was ever used for.
Looking the other way
The bridge from the room
Quite disappointed with this pic of the whole thing but it kinda shows the scale of it.
This outfalls 100m or so further on, underneath the boat hoist. It was already 4ft deep at this point but only a few hours past high tide. During the day I went to see if I could see the outfall, now I knew where it was. Again it was only a couple of hours past high tide so I wasn't expecting much but I could just see the top of the box. Presumably at low or very low tides you can walk right in
Hope yer liked it thanks for lookin...
