#Djerriwarrah Bridge

[vicmemories]

Djerriwarrah Bridge - 1858/59

“The old Ballarat Road Bridge over the Djerriwarrh Creek west of Melton, built 1858-59, is significant as a rare and highly intact example of a bridge built to accommodate gold-rush traffic, and for its unusual design and materials. It is one of Victoria’s oldest bridges of any type, and a rare intact 1850s road bridge.

It is a notable and scarce example of a round or Roman arch bridge in Victoria. It is a rare sandstone masonry arch bridge in Victoria. The bridge retains tool marks associated with its quarrying.

The related quarry, also has a high potential to provide information relating to gold-era construction practices. Substantially elevated, the single arched bridge is supported by large masonry abutments articulated with slightly projecting piers.

The bridge is composed of three bays, with solid sandstone retaining walls flanking the arched opening.The bridge has is relatively intact and has a high integrity. While all capping stones are intact, most have been vandalised, with names cut into the soft stone. The original tool marks in the soft stone are also weathering away.

A dedication plaque on the bridge has been removed. On the upstream side there is evidence of early timber groin or wing walls. This may be part of a longer term problem of scouring. The gouged abutments of the bridge and base of the stream have been repaired with concrete.

The setting of the bridge, in a deep escarpment with some remnant native vegetation, is notably beautiful and dramatic.The first main road to the Ballarat diggings was the ‘Portland Road’, which was roughly the line of the present Melton Highway from Keilor, which passed just north of Pykes Station (later Melton), approximately along the line of Centenary Avenue, and after skirting north of a heavy box forest came down to the present crossing of Djerriwarrh Creek (or Deep Creek as it was often called). Shortly after the 1851 announcement of the discovery of gold at Ballarat, John Chandler set off with his party. They crossed the ‘very rickety bridge’ (with toll) at Keilor: ‘We were evidently among some of the first parties, for there was not much track to be seen...”. They became lost on the Keilor Plains, arriving at ‘Staughton’s’, who showed them the way. There had been a little improvement, but it remained a dangerous crossing

Incidences of destroyed wagons and horse teams continued until the time the bridge was built. A study undertaken for VicRoads in 1994 identified two historical archaeological sites in the area, on the west side of the creek: a ‘Wayside Inn’ beside the ‘old coach road’ (which is clearly visible from the eastern side of the creek), and a house site.

The whole Djerriwarrh Creek valley was public land, later designated a ‘farmers common’. Local belief is that the original ford crossing, the ‘old bullock track’ (after which a nearby road has recently been named) was situated approximately 400 metres upstream of the present (old) bridge, over a stone ford. An early map, predating the goldrush, shows the crossing as a track fording the stream three times at a horseshoe bend. Vines estimates that the original line approaching the stream followed a spur just south of the existing highway, turned north at the final drop to the first of the fords (now disturbed) which was situated between the old and the new bridges. The second ford was just upstream of the 1858-59 bridge, from which the track headed north-west to the third ford ‘which is still visible in its original position, marked by flanking red gum trees’. Having crossed the creek the road then followed an easy gradient up the south side of a gully, the tracks of which are known locally as the ‘old coach road’.

On the Melton side of the creek history has recorded two sites. The Ben Nevis Hotel was erected by Ewen McKinnon atop the escarpment. A toll gate was erected on the Melton side of the bridge in April 1861; the house and gate were burnt down in 1870.10 Archaeological evidence at the top of the escarpment – a scatter of handmade bricks and a hollow where some bottles were found – may be related to one of these sites, more likely the hotel.

Land to the north of bridge once used for the growing of vines, which are thought to have failed through the lack of water. Land to the south of bridge was at one stage used as cherry orchards. The whole area of the road crossing has been designated as a site of historical and archaeological significance.

As traffic on the Ballarat Road increased, and roads deteriorated under the wheels of drays and bullock wagons, road and bridge construction became essential. The Djerriwarrh Creek crossing was a particular hazard because of the steep descents. As a result it is one of only very few gold-era bridges to have been constructed in Victoria, and one of even fewer to survive.

A contract for bridge was let on the 20th October 1858 by newly created Department of Roads and Bridges of the Board of Lands and Works. The contract price was ₤2,583, and the successful contractor Robert Barbour. Sandstone for construction of the bridge was quarried on site; the quarry hole was on the western side of the creek. Workers camped in tents beside site in bed of the creek. The bridge was completed on 31 March 1859.

While the opening of the Geelong to Ballarat railway c.1862 would have decreased traffic on the road, the route was still well patronised, and in 1873 Cobb & Co. line put on a new coach to carry 25 passengers, to complement its massive ‘Leviathan’ coach of 1860, with a capacity of 100 passengers. At least until the opening of the direct Melbourne to Ballarat railway in 1889 the bridge provided a vital link on the busy coach road between Ballarat and the railway station at ‘Keilor Road’ (Sydenham). Hotels in the Melton Shire benefited from the through traffic, providing stabling and victuals.

In 1960 the bridge was by-passed by a reinforced concrete bridge. In 1963 it was restored by the Country Roads Board.The bridge’s Djerriwarrh Creek setting is also of natural significance. There is an interesting mix of native plants – including Fragrant Saltbush, Saloop and Scruby Saltbush found in the area. Bull Mallee growing along the creek is part of the former Long Forest,18 now protected under the Flora and Fauna Guarantee Act and on Register of National Estate.

The road cutting on the north side of the highway east of the bridge is significant because it gives clear exposure of bedrocks that underlie the volcanic plain:- it exposes shales overlain by Werribee Formation sediments and newer volcanic basalts.

There are few similar bridges elsewhere in Victoria, most surviving early bridges having been built of bluestone and being considerably later. Firstly, it is one of only very few intact road bridges from the 1850s. Most of the surviving bridges of this era (generally meaning stone arch bridges) were built as part railway projects - the Flinders Street to St Kilda railway, and the Melbourne to Mount Alexander railway: the Dorcas, Banks and Parks Streets South Melbourne (1857), and the Macedon Street bridge at Sunbury (c.1859).

Other mainly small road over railway masonry arch bridges were built in the early 1860s as construction of the Bendigo and Ballarat railways proceeded. These railway bridges were built to an exceptional standard of design and workmanship.The only intact non-railway road bridge known to predate the Djerriwarrh Creek bridge is Youl’s bridge at Woolsthorpe (1856).This is thought to have been built to provide access to the port of Warrnambool primarily for wool growers, but also diggers. Other surviving road bridges opened at the same time are those at Batesford over the Moorabool River (1859), and Avenel, over Hughes Creek (c.1859).There were also some beam road bridges built in the 1850s, such as McMillans Bridge over the Little Woady Yallock Creek, but all known examples have had their girders replaced, and only the original (usually modified) masonry abutments survive. The earliest surviving metal girder and stone abutment bridges were again built as part of railways, such as the Hotham Road bridge at Ripponlea (c.1860), and the bridges built on the Bendigo line in the early 1860s.

Secondly, the bridge is a rare surviving non-bluestone arch bridge in Victoria, other known examples being Avenel (1859, sandstone), Harcourt (road over rail, 1862, granite), Waurn Ponds (1869, limestone), Newtown at Beechworth (1874, granite).Thirdly, it is a scarce round, or ‘Roman’, arch road bridge, and the first of these bridges that is known to have been built. Interestingly, another bridge in Melton Shire, carring the Melton Highway over the Kororoit Creek, also has a round arch (bluestone), and may also have been built very early (contract let 1859). The other known major examples are: Corkscrew Bridge near Aitkens Gap (1862), Blampied (1883, the only known example of a road bridge with more than one round arch), and at Little River.Several notable examples of round arch railway bridges were being built at the same time for the Mount Alexander railway: Harpers Creek Sunbury (c.1859) and Sunbury Creek Sunbury (c.1859). The very distinctive round arches on these bridges are enhanced by their very high settings, and multiple spans. Other known railway round arch bridges were built at Riddells Creek, Harcourt, and Moorabool.

The most comparable bridge in terms of its important goldfields origins is the ‘Corkscrew Bridge’, which carried the Mount Alexander Road over a branch of the Kororoit Creek on the Gisborne side of Aitkens Gap. This also had a single round arch, but was built in 1862, in bluestone, and is much lower.” — in Long Forest.

By Peter Cin.