UNITED KINGDOM : Photographic postcard. The transporter bridge over the Mersey at Runcorn opened in 1905. The design was chosen as being a relatively inexpensive crossing for road traffic that was high enough above the river to allow access for shipping. A trolley ran on rails along the gantry, with a car suspended underneath at the same level as the road access on either side of the bridge. People and vehicles were carried across in the car. The Runcorn Transporter Bridge was the longest continually operating bridge of its type in the world. The growth in vehicle traffic and the slowness of loading and unloading the car rendered the transporter bridge obsolete however, and in the early 1960s it was replaced by a single-arch high-level road bridge and demolished. (Photo by SSPL/Getty Images)
