Picturesque Engineering: Telford's Highland Roads and Bridges
foreign here in London and hello to our friends joining us remotely from points far away it's a pleasure to be here and thank you for that warm introduction so this is the the dean bridge in Edinburgh um and this is where all this research started for me one day when I was frustrated and wandering around Edinburgh and inspired by this bridge it got me thinking about infrastructure and scenic areas infrastructure in the landscape uh and how and when we think about the relationship between basic transportation and communication and its relationship to areas of great Beauty and scenery I'm doing my Fulbright at the National Library of Scotland right now and this is one of the pot Maps Timothy Pont uh who was one of the first great photographers in Scotland and he came up with these these series of maps and what I like about this is this is pre-highway network and you see here these illustrations of buildings places the landscape land features as I've been wander around London today it reminds me of the tourist Maps I see right there's Westminster Abbey there's the Tower of London and you see them depicted on a maps and that's how people figure things out this reminds me very much of that and if you look at my research at National Library right now we can look at resources like this and take it up into the 20th century this is part of the Bartholomew archive I'm sure many of you might be familiar with Bartholomew map company and in the early 20th century the idea of motor tourism exploring the landscape in a motor car becomes very popular and clearly this advertisement is appealing to that type of customer for Bartholomew Maps this is clearly somebody not in a great hurry clearly someone engaging with a landscape the old mile marker here a milestone gives a sense of the history and Legacy that might be before the auto age as well there's lots of subtle cues within the singular image was this idea of the automobile and travel and tourism and we'll be exploring that this evening so I got I got suffered in this bridge and toughert's work within larger projects and resources until first level of details they're really quite elegant I think there's a real modernity to telford's design work that's simple and clean and looks very much like something uh we might even see today so I'm sure you're familiar with Thomas tough for the great civil engineer the Colossus of Rhodes as Robert Saidi the poet termed him and everything you read about his biographies is about his engineering skills his engineering prowess and his great ability to to tackle obstacles in the natural world um and yet I was curious about telford's work with the picturesque landscape with the Romantic ideas of landscape during this period did he have an appreciation for design and art in addition to his being skilled as a civil engineer so telford's personal letter is at the um the civil engineering Library here institution of civil engineering Library here in London so I had a chance to read his letters and find out what he thought about landscape and what he thought about design he had a lifelong correspondence with a gentleman named Andrew little and one of his longest letters to little is when he visits the Gardens at Stowe he goes into great detail about his time at Stowe how the landscape is laid out how you move through the landscape and you can see here from the triumphal Arch we descended into the valley and found the park divided from the garden by a sunk fence that's the idea of the haha device in the landscape right we turned to the north and passed the water in the main Valley by a palladian bridge okay and he goes on and on it's the longest letter he writes and exquisite details and to his dear friend Andrew little at the end of the letter he says if my poor ability to convey this to you uh it's not sufficient I should be very very pleased to go back and do this all over again so that to me is a very enthusiastic endorsement of Telford having an understanding for the landscape he says in the letter two I believe the guards were originally designed by Kent meaning William Kent and I think they've been updated by Mr Brown capability Brown so he clearly was conversant with landscape gardening during this period so from Stowe to the dean bridge in Edinburgh I'm thinking about is there a way to look at telford's engagement with the landscape and in particular with his Highlands works in Scotland so that brings us to pictures engineering Thomas tougher and Highland roads and bridges um this isn't one of his Bridges and I love this image this is a really wonderful picturesque idea of infrastructure within the landscape so in 1819 Thomas Telford and Robert Southie go on a six-week tour to inspect the Highland Rhodes Bridges canals and harbors being developed as part of this major infrastructure investment to stop the depopulation of the Highlands and provide modern infrastructure and access so it's an enormous project and I like the idea of a civil engineer and a poet traveling I think in terms of our views of of design today professional silos and relationships we'd often think of pairing engineers and Poets and I'm thinking after tonight's talk maybe maybe we should right so Telford and Southern I gave a talk about this tour in 2019 on the bicentennial the uh their tour at National Library in Scotland here's a map of their route this is a really aggressive six-week Tour by carriage uh my colleague Christopher Fleet the National Library of Scotland put together this map and you can see here the route that they took through the Highlands and this is so this journal again here at the Institute of civil engineering Library in London which I had a chance to look over as well so this gets us the idea of modern roads and travel I don't think we realize how recent modern roads and the ability to move across the landscape reliably and easily really is and it's really not until the end of the 18th century that modern Road technology and modern vehicle design allowed us to be able to move through the landscape comfortably and safely Carriage us notoriously uncomfortable and they were dangerous they weren't reliable in terms of breaking so the idea of traveling in the landscape to go up a steep hill to take in a view would have been absolutely ridiculous and unwise up until this period this is all happening about the same time this new awareness for the picturesque landscape the idea of natural beauty being something worthy of our admiration and study so it's all happening right now um and we see it's a huge part of popular culture Jane Austen and Pride and Prejudice and what is 50 miles of good road a little more than half a day's Journey yes I called a very easy distance this is a remarkable ability to move through the landscape Walter Scott the times have changed and nothing more than the rapid conveyance of intelligence and communication betwixt one part of the Scotland and another and I love Scott's descriptions of modern roads within the landscape male coach racist against male coach in the high flyer against high flyer through the most remote districts of Britain in our village alone three post coaches and four coaches with men armed and in Scarlet kassex Thunder through the streets each day they're armed oh this is all part of the modern male system and because of Highway robbers uh our mail carriages allowed Safe Travel and Transport of information you could reliably send something this was the internet of its day and this is my favorite Scott quote of all I have seen the vehicle Thunder down the hill glittering all the while by flashes from a cloudy Tabernacle of dust which it is raised and leaving a train behind it on the road resembling a wreath of Summer midst what are we talking about here the choking dust that these fast-moving vehicles are kicking up in all these Villages right it's a cloudy Tabernacle like a summer mist of It's A really lovely lovely way to describe the dust on the public highway right but that Romanticism that affection for modern roads and what they can do is remarkable during this period and it's celebrated and we see it in in popular literature so just a few facts here between 1750 and 1810 Journey times in Britain between London and points are reduced by two-thirds in 1785 there's daily coach service between London to Norwich Liverpool and Leeds and that's extended a year later to Edinburgh so we can reliably move and send information part of what's allowing this to happen are modern roads uh Thomas Telford and McAdam John McAdam both established modern ways of building roads this is really the first major investment in advancement in scientific engineering for road construction since the Roman period along with trustage and France these three lay the foundations for modern Highway Construction today the layering of gravel and building up a base that's obviously well drained but for its planned for the the Glasgow to Carlisle Mail Road and when we look at Sotheby's Journal on the first page he's arriving in Edinburgh by the Carlisle male so he's himself engaging with this new modern system of Transportation so the images I'm going to show you this evening of it's an 1819 tour that Saudi and Telford take we tried to find images and Maps which were about 10 years on other side so it's a fairly good depiction of what the landscape and places look like during their travel so and again this will all be from Southeast Journal so August 17th reached Edinburgh on the Carlyle mail at quarter past 5 a.m these were running around the clock by the way and you just you got on and you it was like schedules today Edinburgh was alive when I entered it even at that early hour there was a busy greens Market in the High Street I got into Mr rickman's apartments at McGregor's hotel and Princess Street so work with my colleague at National Library of Scotland princess straight McGregor hotel we were able to find out that it was 18 and 19 Prince Street which is right there very conveniently on this 1819 map with that that period so we know this is exactly where they stayed what I love about this and this tour of theirs what's across the street The Carriage works the modern vehicles that allow you to move through the landscape comfortably now are being manufactured directly across the street from where these two great men will be staying at their first meeting at Edinburgh and if we move in on this in the middle of the carriage yard we see a Baruch this is the popular touring Carriage this really has no useful purpose other than wandering through the landscape and enjoying the scenery and the views it's open it's a touring carriage it's a very specific type of vehicle constructed based on Modern materials comfortable suspension for the first time in reliable braking the tour of the inspection tour of the Rose Bridges canals and harbors was organized by John Rickman who was with the commission for roads and bridges in the highlands and we see here something has a very nice wit about him as well went with r Rickman to the college to look at the Preposterous ceiling of their intended Museum a rich specimen of ill-directed expenditure so I did my PhD University Edinburgh and uh I have no comments Mr Telford arrived in the afternoon from Glasgow there was so much intelligence in his countenance so much frankness kindness and hilarity about him flown from the never-ending never failing Wellspring of happy nature that was upon cordial terms within in five minutes there's a rapid affection between these two men which is quite good because they'll be traveling together for six weeks in the highlands Thursday August 19th the nightmare was at McGregor's hotel last night she went to my neighbor's room instead of mine for which I thank her and he awoke me with three of the most Dreadful groans I ever heard so lots of commentary that makes us a very interesting tour well may Edinburgh be called Old Ricky you might smoke bacon by hanging it out of the window the houses in Edinburgh are numbered across the street the odd numbers on one side the even on the other a convenient Arrangement after one has found it out so you get a census this can be a very entertaining tour between these two gentlemen Friday August 20 rows at 5 packed my trunk inserted my journal in in my journal all the remaining memorabilia concerning Edinburgh and now the coaches at the door and I love this Naismith painting here um with this idea of what they would be seeing as they're departing Edinburgh and look here in the foreground at these very well people traveling wandering exploring this very picturesque landscape this kind of rough craggy Rock outcropping historically see people like this Promenade in French Gardens and Royal palaces this idea of seeing a level of beauty interest in activity in the landscape like this it's a very very new approach to thinking about the landscape and outdoor space so the picturesque and I love if you remember that earlier pot map I showed you from Scotland where you saw the buildings right the tower houses in Scotland you're here you have this great picturesque image here in the highlands and one of like all as well another Naismith so William Gilpin is considered the the individual that first promotes this idea of the picturesque and this new appreciation for landscape uh and beauty uh he has all these wonderful water costs and he often includes the road as part of the conversation this is the access into the highlands these New Roads and this is uh near Loch Lomond this is one of the military roads built by General Wade in the 1730s again this is after all the uprising and all the um the political upheaval and the highlands Wades roads were built between three and five meters wide so they're very narrow they're simply to move troops and Wade built the roads raise or straight regardless of the topography the highlands so it's a lot of this and a lot of that very rapidly through the landscape um but they become very picturesque and you see this women and children are just sort of resting here along the side of the road and gilchman is thinking for he's thinking the future and we see these influences in the National Park system and the Parkways in the United States this idea of constructing a road uh to engage the landscape not accidentally but very carefully choreographing landscape movement through roads and he's looking here in the Lake District about building a Carriage Road that's deliberately constructed to Showcase views Saturday August 21 after breakfast we started for Lake Katrin and the title of this painting is landscape with tourists so modern tourism and one of these questions that arise from all this investment is it certainly wasn't a plan to create a modern tourism industry through these roads but people will quickly accessed now it's the popularity of the picturesque makes this a desirable destination and people start traveling and wandering and clearly enjoying all of these places so again another there's a series of this is from that embra a city uh Library museums collection some really wonderful watercolors from this period and of course one of the things that polite people did on these tours was was paint paint and explore and investigate but look at this this is very likely one of the military roads this will be very difficult and there's there's comments from studying the journals at different points being a little bit nervous about the travel and wondering how comfortable the the horses may be uh in this area as well but again the idea of the picturesque The Rustic Bridge the rough water The Rustic landscape near the end of the second lake is a small land where carriages stop and guides are at the Readiness this was a farmer house to Walter Scott brought the trossex and led Catrin into fashion so this is rapid increase in tourism think about places that you've traveled that suddenly become popular right and you have to book ahead or plan ahead or maybe you didn't book ahead and plan ahead long enough um so travel influences things and suddenly at several points compliments telephone for planning ahead on their tour uh because they probably would not have had rooms for their group we're also traveling with sudley's family and a series of Commissioners with the highlands project as well so it's a large group traveling here and Telford knows enrichment certainly is organized as the plan ahead because of the popularity of this area for travel and tourism there's an image of Ben Loman again but these images of of livestock and Farmers this idea of the working landscape as being something worthy of our attention and interests and curiosity Monday August 23rd the approach to dunk held from this side is particularly fine the cathedral which though grievously injured is most happily placed with the river in front and some Noble Woods Rising on the ground behind so picturesque tourism tintern Abbey in Wales as well these all become places so certainly the highlands the Lake District and Wales are the popular destinations during this period for travelers it doesn't hurt too that we're also in the Napoleonic War so the idea of domestic tourism also becomes important too so there's all these convergences always another thing that happens in avoid and this I just I love this image this captures me the whole idea of the picturesque landscape and the infrastructure within it and you get the sense of the picturesque in terms of representing human activity such as the cathedral then the beautiful Bridge here note two with the road as well you see the people walking along the road you know we're so structure day in terms of how we look at Transport Systems right um you know as I'm wandering around London you know there's the traffic but there's also the bus lanes and there's the bike lanes and the bike people don't know I stop when I'm crossing the street and there's all these things that I have to pay attention to right because there's all these individual groups moving very closely together on separate systems this is a period when the road is the road and everybody uses it um and you read people complaining about animals being driven to Market along the road and you know being held up by thousands of Geeks being taken to Market um so there's all these things about interaction in shared space which are very foreign to us today because we tend to think of a road for an automobile correct um not a thing that everyone uses freely and everyone uses it with the same level of right of access if you look at some of the traffic coming up particularly in the Netherlands right now where they're moving a lot of the control devices in in City centers where everyone has equal right of the road it's going back to this idea of larger shared access and greater Equity of use for for all users and travelers the bridges want to tell for its finest Works once works on one of the finest in Scotland so what happens with this tour is we see suddenly developing an appreciation for engineering and it's commentary and its details become much more specific as he becomes more educated as it goes along this this tour and the Bridget dunk held us one particularly where suddenly talks about you see there's a the rail is masonry across the bridge and see if this sounds familiar right he's complaining with about Westminster and the budget for this project because he can Envision this bridge being around for a very very long time and for a meager extra bit of funding they could have had a really elegant balustrade on the bridge he talks about how Telford very nicely uses rows of stone to create some of the the shadow line here which gives a nice look to the bridge and he's aware that tougher is becoming quite Adept at using a very limited budget and maximize the aesthetic input but it was also making a larger comment which I think is very relevant today about the fact that we invest in transport for Generations um the London underground tunnels right all of these things we build them and we use them for centuries until somebody's saying you know a few few more pounds in this project would really make a huge difference for posterity and we should be thinking that way he's very aware of this as a major investment in the highlands and a long-term idea of place and identity within the landscape as well Tuesday August 24th just in time to escape a heavy rain and we arrived at Dundee just as the daylight failed helpers is a happy life everywhere making roads Building Bridges forming canals and creating harbors so we get a sense that Telford really likes his work and is very aware of what we might think of as the idea of place today or location or a cultural landscape for example with some of the harbor works at Dundee a good media persons were assembled to see us depart and therefore was and therefore was not sorry when the coach was in motion and we had beta do to Bonnie Dundee so I think something was more than ready to move on from there for some reason or another I don't know are both Abby again another picturesque ruin a kind of a must-see during this period of travel right another one of my favorite study quotes several booksellers books sellers shops which indeed seem to be more numerous in Scotch than English towns so if there's a nice compliment to the people of Scotland and here are both I saw more prostitutes walking the streets than I would think have been seen in any English town of No Greater extent or population so uh just can't quite just leave it Go and provide a nice compliment to Scotland here um Friday 27 August old Aberdeen is about a mile off from the new city it has something of a Collegiate character and air of quietness and permanence and what I like about this show is this again a classic idea of the picturesque in terms of people engaging with the landscape you get a sense of a woodland here a rough road of roots coming out in the landscape people were climbing on rocks things that you witness to see fashionable people having and having done a few years earlier right so it's this whole shift in appreciation and that's what I find so interesting during this period there's this convergence modern transportation in terms of vehicles modern transportation in terms of Roads and a new appreciation for the landscape it's a magic convergence and you couldn't have one part of this without the other parts you can't go pleasure driving on a miserable Road um they're not coming back expensive Carriage to drive to Scenery that nobody has any value right so it's all coming together right now at this point the scotch regard architectural Beauty in their private homes as well as in their public edifices much more than we do that's it there's no slight comment that follows up so we're moving into the tour and so these affection for Scotland seems to be growing Wednesday September one it began to rain when we renewed our journey but held up before we had Advanced two miles when we came upon the Craig ellichi Bridge one of telfort's works and a noble work it is um this is a spectacular bridge in the highlands the road brings a traveler by a short tour to the two short turrets at the entrance of the bridge on this side they are merely ornamental on the other the weight is necessary for the abutment the bridges of iron beautifully light a situation where the utility of lightness is instantly perceived okay so we're really talking about the details here of a bridge infrastructure project but what covers time out the towers here have no structural value The Rock outcropping here is supporting this side of the bridge you need the turrets structurally on this side to support the weight because you don't have the rock it would have been cheaper to just have something on this side not that side but Telfer is in pushing his budget picture this with turrets only on one side right it just it falls apart in terms of being a beautiful bridge in the landscape right so building something providing a level of ornament on one side to balance the visual weight of the bridge this is one of the most photographed bridge in Scotland when you go to the tourist site for this area the bridge is one of the first things that pops up so we know that it was a good investment because it's still paying dividends today so travel infrastructure in terms of roads and bridges and canals but also travel infrastructure in terms of Tourism during this period as well which is growing rapidly here's an image of Sterling Castle which becomes a very early destination for people to go and we see these Early Travel Maps as well these are called strip Maps where you have the roads page after page you can follow this very easily it's a great easy Atlas to carry with you and everything you need to know in terms of taverns blacksmith shops churches Bridges or Fords all the information provided for you and these were usually updated on a regular basis many many of these were by subscription and it's this is a very nice practical everyday travel guide but look at this 1810 okay traveling map of Scotland you have this wonderful just picturesque idea here look at this you know come come join me in Scotland right it's a traveling map and this is clearly Beyond an everyday map to find your way from A to B right this is packaged it's a gorgeous system the maps forward out of this collector's box right okay this shows the level of investment in tourism resources also gives us a sense of the types of people that are traveling an average everyday person to get a very affordable map but people of means could invest fully we do this today right think about when you're traveling would you like to upgrade we can upgrade you and we can upgrade you with a map in 1810 for Scotland as well and what I love about these Maps is here you see the map unfolded we don't use a whole lot of paper maps before but I'm sure some of you remember trying to fold and refold the map which never goes back the way it's supposed to um these Maps each panel they're mounted on linen so they fold together perfectly and beautifully every time very nice very clever probably very pricey for the period as well which lately has been started to apply between Glasgow and Fort William as many as 100 have sometimes landed there to idle away more or less time according to their means and Leisure many of them Landing in the morning and returning in the evening okay this is the weekend day trip right um with steamboats accessing the highlands now you can have an Excursion right so again this idea of infrastructure not so much Rose this is a case where the steamboat allows this access Friday September 3rd Fort George stands on a neck of land from hence you look up the Firth to the mountains on each side of the Glen of Scotland now noted for the Caledonian canal Saturday September 4. he'll return aside and went four miles up the river along strathglass Road one of the new works and one of the most remarkable of them and something goes into great detail here about how the roads are constructed how the drainage is organized and he also talks about circumstances again there's always a complaint about Westminster and funding but it comes back at times say like you know tougher despite his meager budget slightly shifted the road to allow for a view of the lock or slightly shifted the road to allow for a view of this this mountain or this this land form so you can tell that telford's building a practical useful Road network from the highlands but it's taking every opportunity that he can to be sure that it works nicely with the landscape and many of these roads are still in use today the road itself is an object which adds greatly to the beauty and interests of these scenes and I really like that this is the picturesque movement we're talking about natural landscapes we're talking about the idea of romantic ruins in the landscape and something is including these new modern roads as part of the beauty of the landscape the landscape Gardener Humphrey Repton of also practicing just before this period often looked at the idea of the beauty of the line of the road and the landscape and it's a way to provide a sense of scale and a large vast landscape you see a lovely gentle thread moving through the landscape it gives you a sense of scale and space and in some ways makes the landscape more Grand when you see how small that little thread is going through the landscape so the idea again of the road being an object of beauty this is the Bonner Bridge this is no longer there um but I like this so there's several um parts of the journal where they include commentary from people that they meet along the way um their visit gets quite a bit of attention especially in the small towns and villages and this is from a gentleman they went as I went along the road by the side of the water said he I could see no bridge at last I came in sight of something like a spider's web in the air if this be it thought I it will never do but presently I Came Upon it and oh it is the finest thing that ever was made by God or man that's quite an endorsement from the average guy along the side of the road talking to these two guys about this idea of infrastructure and again think of these these new modern materials now you know up to this period a bridge has been muscular and masonry right and now there's these delicate things that really had people rethinking about what's the bridge look like this is a huge shift in terms of the Aesthetics the visual presentation of the bridge there's a September 14 the day was passed in Inverness and writing letters and bringing up my journal so they did have a break once in a while it wasn't all all looking at roads and bridges and canals all the time but you get a sense of of this journey Wednesday September 15 left Inverness after breakfast we also see lots of commentary this is a wonderful journal to read by the way on food quality of food foul food um and everything in between it rained during our Halt and continued to rain heavily when the carriage stopped above the fall of foyers it is not credible to the owner of this property that there should be no means of getting at the bottom of the Fall what I like about this it's private property and yet there's this expectation now during the picturesque that people have the right of access to Scenic wonders like this Scenic destinations and it's very clear you need to provide access this is the destination people know it's a destination people want to see this I have been here I read Southeast Journal here it's still a wonderful place and it's I think it's still hard to get to today but there are there are stairs that get you down so this idea of taking in the scenes right um these are the things that you know Google Maps are going to say like oh you should take a picture here right Monday September 20 the parallel roads are among the most extraordinary objects in Europe or the world it would not have been possible to view this extraordinary scene with better companions than such a surveyor as Mr Telford and such a clear quick accurate scrutinizer is Mr Rickman so this is real this is an ideal opportunity you're traveling with people that know what they're doing and suvi is capturing all this and what I really find useful for this journal as a historian is if you read the reports from the commission it's all very clinical right you know this many men this many horses this much Stone and we build a bridge according to Telford specifications what something gives us is the romance of this and something gives us some of the background you know the brailling could have been finer or he shifted the road those nuances of Engagement with the highlands landscape don't really come out in the official reports so the the parallel roads these are natural landforms it's quite striking and these are considerably remarkable must-sees in terms of visit to the highlands during this period and you can see them marked on maps as well that helps with the asterisks you can see the parallel roads are labeled on maps so this is clearly a recognizable landscape feature and again a place that people are going to visit September 19th the Caledonian canal and what I find interesting about this is this is such a remarkable work of engineering and Technical prowess and nation-building and everything and somebody spends time on this but not as much time as we've seen on some of the aspects because the canal is the canal the roads and bridges are more intimate and they're a different scale and they're much more aligned with the idea of the picturesque because they're they're nestled into the landscape a bit more nevertheless saw these clearly impressed with this not to say that he's not you can see at the section down here at the bottom and you can look at the the locks here for the cow the pyramids would appear insignificant in such a situation for in them we should perceive only a vain attempt to view with greater things but here we see the powers of nature brought to act upon a great scale in subservience to the purposes of man so it's a very clear endorsement and a reminder in the journal about what this is doing for the highlands and what this is doing Nationwide for the idea of investment in Access which is really what this project was all about and this is one of the spot syndrome where you really get that sense of this idea of of engineering and this is a obviously a major engineering work of great importance Wednesday September 22nd I'm used ourselves on the rocky shores of the great Lindy lock I could not have enjoyed a more lively pleasure in all of this if I had been five and 30 years younger so what's happening here too is the tour is starting to wind down a little bit now and you start seeing this sort of sentimental association with the tour and what's happening um and this idea of this intense engagement with the landscape and getting to know each other quite well along this period of time is too well Friday September 24th lock all was soon in sight with a number of small Islands beautifully Diversified with wood the ruins of a castle upon one and I'm so grateful for the Edinburgh City collection you have these really great watercolors it actually captures some of these scenes right so we can get a sense of what it might have been like for them uh and the landscape and what they were seeing and I think the sepia captures the general weather in Scotland anyway a lot of the time so they would have been probably filtering this through a sepia gray gaze anyhow but again look here I like your eye kind of goes here to the room but look at the how prominently placed the road is here in the foreground and you see people are with maybe people on horseback traveling the road as well so the roads are so prominent in all these things and when you think about this as being a painting right the road could have been edited out to focus just on the picturesque landscape and the ruin right uh and yet here it is sometimes subtle sometimes very direct but the idea of the road I think we need to go back to What's Happening Here with modern roads and modern vehicles people are very very self-aware of the opportunity that's very very new to be able to go places like this in relative comfort and explore like this think about the early days of jet travel right you know kind of being blown away like well I just left New York and I'm here or I'm doing this you know every Innovation we've had in travel and mobility and speed comes with a period of like wow who would have thought I could have done that now the back of a 747 in the middle seat maybe not so romantic but not every moment here was romantic either but there's a very strong awareness of new infrastructure new technology and new abilities to access and see things Sunday September 25th the ascent is about four miles in length The Descent is through Glen Crow on someone is a seat in a green Bank burying the beautiful inscription which all travelers have noticed rest and be thankful go into Google Maps zoom in on guangco you'll see a little spot there that Google's giving you it says rest and be thankful and you're supposed to take a photograph there just so you know um nothing's really changed Right There Are Places of beauty places of affection that people feel the need travel to I think what happens very globally with these investments in Scotland at the time too is it starts to build a very strong sense of national landscape identity Scotland and the idea of the Highlands as a destination a place that if you read a few decades before this convergence at the end of the century most of the descriptions of travel in the highlands was it's miserable and the landscape is depicted as ominous foreboding dangerous beware it's unpredictable nothing at all is going to inspire you to go and travel and within a few decades with these changes in technology and the new idea of the picturesque it's magical it's gorgeous it's picturesque um it's worthy of my attentions it's worthy of my SketchBook Monday September 27 we arose The Summer's Rising low in a red sky ominous of rain here we took Leva Mitchell one of the members of the commission a remarkable man and well deserving to be remembered and here we see some of the new Industries on the outskirts of Glasgow were getting back into the modern world the tour is is winding down now um and we're seeing the industrial complex that's the antithesis to this time in the highlands yeah we're also seeing the opportunities the Industrial Revolution it allowed and facilitated a lot of this to happen in terms of construction and Technology as well so it's a real dichotomy here between the beauty of Nature and the access afforded based on Modern Technologies and of course you can see here at carriage in the foreground that just reminds us of this idea of travel during this period Friday October 1 Longtown here we left Mr tufford who takes the mail for Edinburgh the male being of course the mail system right the post system so he's he's traveling on a system that he helped to help to build and facilitate this parting company after the thorough intimacy which a long journey produces between fellow Travelers who like each other is a Melancholy thing a man heartily to be liked more worthy to be esteemed and admired I have never fallen in with and therefore it is painful to think of how little likely it is that I shall ever see much of him again how certain that I shall never see so much it's clear this was a really meaningful Journey for Sunday and he has this whole new appreciation for engineering why does there reaching into this trip they're traveling on the estate of Mr the name is X out in the journal um and the roads are quite poor and after some of these experience with new modern roads he decides the most fitting punishment for the owner of this property would be to condemn the gentleman to travel back and forth along the roads all day for several days until he realized they needed to be improved so the ends the journal with a decision to take an alternative route back to Keswick and it would be more Sanic he also says to be a finer root as well and I think in that case that means finer both in terms of scenery and in terms of the quality of the road itself so rest and be thankful right that's my introduction to you of this tour of six weeks in 50 minutes there's lots and more details here but I hope what you can see is this idea of of the investment and infrastructure and I think clearly a case of unintended consequences here in terms of how this facilitated tourism particularly in the highlands and certainly in other places as well but these modern Investments this idea of opportunity the technology to pull off and the funding to pull it off are really quite remarkable and it's a legacy that we still have today and I think it's really quite remarkable so um I'm very happy to answer any of the questions that you have right now I think we're right on time for questions uh so I'll say thank you and turn it over to our expert moderator so thank you very much Dan um I I love the way you Illustrated this with the quotes and I the one that I'm still smiling about is the one about um our growth having more prostitutes than average but I was thinking though presumably very well read on account of the number of books but um anyway um I had always imagined that Telford really had in his mind only the idea of kind of subjugating nature and really my eyes have been open tonight I think that was a remarkable uh Exposition and it's put my you know entirely new thoughts in my head I must say so we've got a couple of lectures a couple of questions online and then I'll just open it up to the floor we have a roving mic so I got to I've got two questions here they're actually rather related um one is one is asking do you think that the public works such as roads were more important than cultural factors uh like Sir Walter Scott's popular novels presumably in altering people's perspectives I would say so in terms of the larger investment was about public works and culture I think was very secondary to the way things were being thought about during this period it was a it was an investment to solve problems I thought about this a little bit if you're familiar with the United States interstate system uh in the second half of the 20th century um that was largely built simply to move people rapidly from one part of the country to another but there were some States states that had large landscape architecture divisions within their public roads departments that took it as an opportunity to build some really beautiful segments of road but they're not all all that way so I think for me the takeaway for this with the highlands is and in a way as much as I wish he had the greater budget that suddenly was arguing for it's a reminder that good design doesn't always have to be overly expensive good desire design requires someone with a sensitivity to a place and some creativity about how to use a limited budget and know where to put money and where not to put money and I think that's to me the real takeaway with this was that and in terms of the culture so they does talk about one of my favorites he talks about one spot where they see a woman washing laundry on the rocks and it was a it was a cleanly and picturesque operation and I always wondered how she might have felt with that back-breaking labor of Washington the river the picturesque we should take a we should do a watercolor of this and this is this is two men two men traveling so uh it's very much of its period so you know we I think we I like to think we're more attuned to cultural resources when we look at Transportation projects today in the 21st century but I can think of some of the projects where it's sort of we say we're doing that but we don't really actually do it so again I think to me the the enlightening moment of this was the fact that there's enough information out particularly with the letters from stove and Telford had an appreciation for this and I think he did everything he could certainly within the context of the period to be sensitive to the cultures there's a related question actually online somebody says what were the Public Works opening up the highlands successful from a public policy perspective in encouraging local people to stay I think he means local people perhaps visitors as well I honestly don't have an answer to that my expectation is it certainly helped because it was much easier moving through the highlands and and just moving materials and goods back and forth so I'm inclined to say yes but I haven't really looked at um changes in the population or changes in economy have some interesting residences actually with with the regional policy in Britain at the moment about putting in high-speed transport Networks providing opportunity in the regions whereas other people are arguing of course it just rains them out more quickly why Arsenal too with the some of the proposed High rail High-Speed Rail quarters as well Humphrey Repton who I did mentioned uh very much uh was the first landscape Gardener to write about design based on mobility in the landscape and how you design a Carriage Drive based on speed and I know through some conversations I've had with the guard Museum here in London that some of remnants ideas are being used to consider High rail High-Speed Rail through the landscape here and how it could be something that could be more engaged with the landscape or not engaged in the landscape based on how it's considered and developed thank you very much um could you just give a little bit of background I mean why were they doing this tour how much of what they saw was down to Telford and and why Roberts how did Robert Southey the poet get involved in it so how did Robert Sunday get involved um my understanding it's not 100 clear was that Rickman who organized a tour new Saudi any new tougher and just thought they might get along which clearly they did so I think it was you know sometimes someone organizes a nice business meeting for you and sometimes they don't and I think this was the idea it's going to be a long trip it's logging through six weeks and Topher might like the company of someone who wouldn't just be talking about engineering all the time that's that's my own personal take on it but that's my understanding was that Rickman thought they would get along well knowing both men well so the tour was um it was part of the if you look back at the acts of parliament right after Union it's 1717 there's a an act of parliament about Rose Bridges and canals and fairies in Scotland and it's requiring an annual review in terms of how things will be managed so I'm imagine because this was a very large Public Works project that this was not just the Public Works project but it tied into a nationwide idea of looking at the quality of Transport infrastructure making sure that funding was going to the right places as being properly executed things are being done it's a very very detailed list of many many pages about what needs to be done who needs to be reporting it and all that and it has to be done on an annual basis thank you this is very very interesting um uh During the period that you're discussing I believe the quality of iron remained highly variable difficult to detect faults and so forth do you have a sense as to how that affected telford's decision making about design both engineering and structural decisions as well as aesthetic decisions I don't know a lot of details about the properties of iron I think reading the commission or being tougher they were certainly experimenting with modern materials and take advantage of those I think tougher there's certainly an idea and we see this in the journal about the beauty that this affords and scenic areas like this allowing the idea of the water to be the dominant feature not so much the the masonry structure as well most of these bridges are relatively small in terms of theirs so I think they were safe places to experiment with these materials as well they were also if you think about it in today's language low volume roads they weren't getting a lot of heavy heavy traffic so good places to try with that as well um but it's still it's a new material so if you look at um there was a bridge over taymouth near Dundee and uh famous Railway Bridge and that collapsed the fourth Bridge outside of Edinburgh that big muscular this kind of diamonds that go across the fourth the fourth that was over engineered because of the fears of these new Metals not being that reliable and public concern with the Bridget taymouth collapsing built out of these new materials so that bridge was very much over engineered just to build public confidence so it's certainly a learning curve these are brand new materials right now there's lots of new Alloys that are being developed during this period as well and that might have been one of the reasons that the Bernard Bridge no longer exists I think that might have been some structural issues over time just on the question of the iron I can add a little bit to that um Telford was very careful about the iron Masters he worked with and so he was able to ensure that he got good quality Iron um things that were cast They proved to us in every single casting and then if it broke they went back and tried together they didn't just proof test it to the load they thought it was going to carry but to about five times uh rosehorn was easier to police because of the process of its fabrication by hammering and rolling out the iron multiple times you got rid of a lot of the defects so he was much much more confident about iron um than some of the people working at the time this is an interesting question isn't it the extent to which the limitations of the material influence the Aesthetics that he was able to achieve that was very similar to your question I apprecially that and I would just add to that as well it's interesting in general so they come it's a number of times too tougher maintained a very very quarter relationship with all of the labor and something notes that people who were often dismissed he tougher would listen to them and take their advice argued at times for better pay so I think that's another form of quality control as well that he had people working for him that respected him and I think that's another another quality control is part of this whole program ladies and gentlemen we have to call this evening to a close I've got two points that I'm asked to remind you about one is that we hope you might consider making a donation to Gresham on the website it's thanks to the generosity of supporters that we're able to continue the mission of providing access to the highest quality lectures free of charge obviously if you make a donation not free of charge but we hope we hope and the second thing I've been asked to remind you about is that the next lecture in this engineering series is by Sue Ion on what is the role of nuclear power in a net zero system so that's going to be something very very different to this but can I thank you very much for your Splendid introduction today and absolutely fascinating so thank you very much thank you
2023-04-16 03:52
