A bridge too far for villagers fighting to save historic landmark

The chairman of Finchingfield Parish council is offering to donate £100,000 of his own money to save the village’s iconic bridge.

Earlier this year Essex County Council put forward proposals to build a new bridge for traffic that would run alongside the existing one but the plans have been met with fierce opposition from residents.

For hundreds of years, it’s connected one side of Finchingfield to the other and has helped make this village one of the most photographed in the country. But this bridge is too weak to cope with the amount of traffic that uses it.

Essex County Council’s latest proposal of building a new bridge alongside side it isn’t going down well.

It’s caused the leader of the parish council to offer up £100,000 of his own money for what he believes is a better solution.

Click below to watch a report by ITV News Anglia's Victoria Lampard

Essex County Council initially proposed to rebuild the bridge, closing it for four months and introducing a 20 mile diversion effectively splitting Finchingfield in two and depriving them of passing trade.

After listening to residents concerns they came up with a new plan.

Although it would be closed to HGVs, the bridge would remain open to other traffic during the work and a new single- track bridge would be constructed next to it.

That would then be used by vehicles and the old bridge would be preserved and used as a pedestrian crossing.

The council says the new structure would be sympathetically modelled on the original bridge to protect the iconic look of the village.

But with more residents offering financial support for the campaign to save their historic landmark, the two sides don’t seem to be getting any closer to agreeing on a solution.