£37m Poole bridge closed again after new problem

A £37 million lifting bridge has been closed again following weeks of disruption.

The Twin Sails Bridge connects Poole town centre to Hamworthy, a peninsula suburb of the Dorset coastal town.

The bridge opened in 2012 but has been plagued with problems and was closed on Boxing Day after one of the “leaves” that makes up the lifting mechanism became stuck halfway on the Poole side.

There had been issues on the Hamworthy side for several weeks and the bridge had opened temporarily under a reduced lifting schedule for Christmas.

The Borough of Poole tweeted an apology to residents affected by the closure.

The council statement read: “Please be aware that the Twin Sails bridge is currently closed to traffic. The traffic signals at Rigler Road have been adjusted to ‘on demand’ to ease flow of traffic.

“We will update you with further information when we know more. Apologies for the inconvenience.

“The closure is due to a fault in an electronic sensor on the Poole side. This is unrelated to the issue on the Hamworthy side. We’re liaising with subcontractors around their availability to make the repairs ASAP.”

The bridge provides a crossing over an area of water known as the Back Water Channel which connects Holes Bay with Poole Harbour.

On December 7 the bridge was closed after experts investigated a “grating noise” coming from a hydraulic cylinder when the bridge was raised.

It reopened on December 18 but the Hamworthy side was running at a reduced capacity meaning it was operating at half the speed.

It closed again on December 26 due an unrelated fault on the Poole side.