Even now, as the glow begins to fade in the dying embers of Scotland’s steel industry, the country has been given a stark reminder of how good it once was at making great things with this tough material. It was as if this dull grey alloy, spurned now after sustaining our livelihoods for so long, was bringing down a devastating revenge on an ungrateful nation. The closure of the Forth Road Bridge on 3 December was caused by a single crack measuring 2cm which was discovered in the bridge’s main southbound deck truss and in several other steel struts.
This tiny fissure, though, has caused the country effectively to declare a national state of emergency. More than 70,000 vehicles are driven across it every day and around 24 million each year. It is one of Scotland’s life-giving arteries, maintaining the circulation of its commerce and taking the weight of its people. To drive across this is still to have your breath taken away, and when those lovely and massive metal shoulders rise up from the bridge to wave you through, you are reassured that the country still lives and breathes.
Now this country of islands and waterways, at the time of the year when its need for its bridges is at its greatest, has lost its most important one for a month; perhaps longer. Christmas in Scotland in 2015 will not be one of its vintage collection.
The Forth Road Bridge, the longest steel suspension bridge in Europe when it was opened in 1964, seemed to be the consummation of Scotland’s relationship with its most precious and vibrant metal. They would always need each other, wouldn’t they? The day would surely never arrive when the country would reject its precious metal and turn off the heat that kept it alive. But that day did arrive in October with the closure of its two last remaining steel plants. The Forth Road Bridge will always commemorate how good this country was with steel and its closure now causes us once more to stop, look up and consider how bloody brilliant it is.
The bridge was opened by the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh on 4 September 1964; it had taken six years to build and seven men had died in its making. Its opening brought to an end one of the oldest continuing ferry services in the world. This was begun in the 11th century by Saint Margaret of Scotland, queen consort to King Malcolm III. The ferry service had operated every day since then until the day another queen effectively made it obsolete nine centuries later.
On a visit to Queensferry last month with a friend we ate lunch in a tavern which sits in the shadow of the bridge. It was the first time since childhood I’d been able to look upon it and its fast and louche older sister, the railway bridge, rather than just drive over its back. As dusk began to fall and lights began to appear here and there between the bridges, something else happened. A few dozen young women, pink and giggly in their strappy heels and happy dresses, ran past us and down to the jetty. Waiting for them was a ferryman preparing to take them slowly across the river with champagne, cigarettes and the sound of One Direction. This was Scotland’s maritime equivalent of the screaming party limo.
Perhaps the Scottish government ministers, for whom previous bad winters have had fatal political consequences, might consider pressing the old ferry back into service. The bridge will be closed until the new year with Holyrood’s transport minister, Derek Mackay, admitting that he couldn’t provide any guarantees about a date for its reopening if bad weather hampered repair work. There could be a brisk daily trade on this service over the water and perhaps ongoing business from people who might simply want a wee sail rather than a drive or a train ride.
The ferry would also be far more comfortable and less stressful than many of the trains provided by ScotRail these days. The country’s national rail operator seems to be conducting an intense competition with the Calcutta rail provider to see which of them can win the title of cramming the most people into a single carriage. It will face huge challenges while the Forth Road Bridge remains closed. The road and rail chaos caused by the closure of the bridge meant that some journeys on Thursday and Friday which would normally have taken less than an hour were taking six, and drivers faced tailbacks on the Kincardine Bridge further upstream stretching back 11 miles.
Many of the businesses in and around the Edinburgh and Fife areas which rely on the road bridge for delivering on time have been taking stock. Early estimates suggest that, in lost working hours and late deliveries, the closure will jag the economy for tens of millions of pounds. Amazon has a massive plant in Dunfermline, just a few miles from the Forth bridges. Last month it launched an ultra-fast service for its Prime members in Newcastle guaranteeing delivery of some items within one hour. They had previously launched the service in London and Birmingham.
Someone in the organisation will be thanking the Lord for not yet rolling out such a speedy delivery service in the Edinburgh area. Last night the company said: “We are used to dealing with transport disruptions and put in place contingency measures to ensure we continue to provide the highest levels of service to our customers.”
For now, the Forth Road Bridge lies eerily empty and quiet. When the third crossing is completed next year it will be become quieter for good. Scotland will always build new bridges for other countries and, in time, need to replace all of its own. All those big, hard constructions which must be made to last for generations, must now be built with someone else’s steel. The third crossing has been built with Chinese steel. Perhaps this act of betrayal was just too much for its Scottish big sister now lying derelict and resentful upstream.
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