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Goitre Coed (Quaker’s Yard) Viaduct

Merthyr Tydfil, Wales

Year

1841

Duration

5 years

Cost

Unknown

Location

Wales
Project achievements

Economy boosted

Helped develop the Merthyr iron and steel industry

Used engineering skill

The crossing over the river Taff was made on the skew

Connected communities

Connected Merthyr Tydfil to Cardiff in Wales

Connect Merthyr Tydfil’s iron industry to Cardiff’s docks

The Goitre Coed Viaduct (also known as Quaker’s Yard Viaduct) is a masonry structure built for the Taff Vale Railway (TVR) connecting Merthyr Tydfil to Cardiff’s docks in Wales.

The civil engineer behind it was none other than Isambard Kingdom Brunel, who agreed to take on the project soon after the Great Western Railway.

He was persuaded by Sir John Guest of the Dowlais ironworks at Merthyr Tydfil, which, under Guest’s stewardship, became the largest ironworks in the world at the time.

Having fulfilled what he called “a troublesome order” for Brunel’s Clifton Suspension Bridge made Guest feel entitled to ask Brunel to cost and then survey what would become the viaduct.

The aim was to transport rails and finished iron to Cardiff for shipping.

Image credit: Elton Collection of the Ironbridge Gorge Museums

‘Goitre Coed Viaduct', 1841

This watercolour by George Childs (1798-1875) of the viaduct shows the slender octagonal columns of Brunel's viaduct with the contractor's timber centering still in place in the nearest arch.

Childs was admitted to the Royal Academy Schools in 1843.

In the watercolour, the Merthyr Tramroad passes under that arch and a locomotive can be seen on it.

Despite Trevithick's pioneering run of 1804, locomotives were not reintroduced until 1832.

This is when the Dowlais Iron Co. ran its locomotive Perseverance to the canal basin at Abercynon.

Image credit: Stephen Rowson

The widening of Goitre Coed viaduct

This black-and-white photograph shows the viaduct in the process of being widened, with new arches being built alongside Brunel’s original.

Looking south at Goitre Coed viaduct, Pinlock’s Tunnel, which is in the process of being opened out, can be seen in the middle distance.

Photograph by Joseph Collings circa 1862.

Did you know …

  1. The TVR was the only standard gauge (4ft 8.5in or 1.44m) railway Brunel engineered in Great Britain.

  2. Brunel's assistant engineer, Samuel Downing, who went on to become a civil engineering professor, used the story of the viaduct as a teaching aid for Victorian engineering students. 

How was the Goitre Coed Viaduct built?

The Welsh landscape challenged Brunel to develop innovative engineering solutions.

In particular, the crossing of the river Taff, which had to be made on the skew.

Goitre Coed Viaduct was, however, no conventional skew arch but a totally Brunelian solution.

It had six 50ft (15.24m) spans springing from five hollow octagon piers, two sides of which were parallel to the axis of the river.

The viaduct performed as Brunel had predicted against the force of the Taff.

However, it only carried a single standard gauge (4ft 8.5in, or 1.44m) line.

When the TVR line started getting doubled in 1846, 41 bridges and viaducts carrying the railway over roads, rivers and canals had to be widened.

Goitre Coed Viaduct’s time came in 1857, with Sir John Hawkshaw as consulting engineer.

Completed in 1862, the viaduct was widened by building a similar sized viaduct alongside the original.

However, the octagonal feature of the piers was now lost and the widened base of the two river piers would cause problems for many years.

Difference the project has made

Now a Grade II-listed structure, the Goitre Coed Viaduct played a formative role in the industrial development of south Wales.

It carried enormous amounts of coal and helped develop the Merthyr iron, and later steel, industry.

It helped the Taff Vale Railway (TVR) become one of the most prosperous railways in Britain.

The TVR’s role today as an urban commuter railway shouldn’t be overlooked.

Indeed, it’s being enhanced with the South Wales Metro, an integrated heavy rail, light rail and bus-based public transport system around the Cardiff valleys.

It will also have a £100 million metro depot and control centre at Taffs Well.

The South Wales Metro demonstrates modern transport innovation in the spirit of Brunel.

Project milestones

1836

Brunel is appointed to the project

1841

Viaduct completed

1857

Viaduct widening authorised following an Act of Parliament

1861-1862

Widening works take place

1988

Viaduct becomes Grade-II listed

People who made it happen

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