Historic Building Details

HB Ref No:
HB14/08/102

Address :
Derryola Bridge Derryola Bridge Road Aghalee BT67 0DJ

Townland:
Deer Park

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Survey 2:
B2

Date of Listing:
13/11/2020 00:00:00

Date of De-listing:

Current Use:
Bridge

Former Use
Bridge

Conservation Area:
No

Industrial Archaeology:
Yes

Vernacular:
No

Thatched:
No

Monument:
No

Derelict:
No

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OS Map No:
144-15

IG Ref:
J0998 6851

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Owner Category

Exterior Description And Setting

Single-span stone-built bridge of perhaps c.1820, carrying a road over a drainage channel. The bridge is located at the junction of Derryola Bridge Road and George’s Island Road, roughly 3km west of the hamlet of Lower Ballinderry, with the drainage channel itself (the ‘Selshan Drain’) extending from the south-east of the bridge to Lough Neagh in the west. The bridge is constructed in semi-coursed squared rubble and has a relatively small semicircular arch with rock-faced voussoirs. The parapets, the north ends of which have been rebuilt (and possibly extended) in recent times, have concrete coping.

Architects

Historical Information

The ‘Selshan Drain’ was probably cut in the wake of the report by engineer Thomas Townsend made to the Parliamentary Commissioners in 1813, which recommended the drainage of ‘the bogs and inundated grounds…all round Lough Neagh’. The channel itself is shown on the OS map of 1832 along with ‘Derryola Bridge’. References – Primary sources 1 ' Map no.6 of the Lough Neagh District…by Thomas Townsend' (1813). Copy available online at https://www.lbrowncollection.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/BRO-04-BOG-36-P-Lough-Neagh.jpg {accessed 18 Febrauary 2019) 2 OS maps six-inch county series, Co. Antrim sheet 62, 1832, 1857, 1900-01 3 'Report from Her Majesty's Commissioners of Inquiry Into the State of the law and practice in respect to the occupation of land in Ireland', (Dublin, 1845), p.478

Criteria for Listing

Architectural Interest

B. Proportion F. Structural System H-. Alterations detracting from building J. Setting

Historic Interest

R. Age X. Local Interest

Evaluation

Derryola Bridge is located at the junction of Derryola Bridge Road and George’s Island Road, roughly 3km west of the hamlet of Lower Ballinderry. It is a single-span, semi-coursed, squared rubble-stone bridge. It has a relatively small semicircular arch with rock-faced voussoirs. Constructed in perhaps c.1820, it carries a road over a drainage channel (the ‘Selshan Drain’) which extends from the south-east of the bridge to Lough Neagh in the west. The drain was probably cut in the wake of the report by engineer Thomas Townsend made to the Parliamentary Commissioners in 1813, which recommended the drainage of ‘the bogs and inundated grounds…all round Lough Neagh’. While the north ends of the parapets have been rebuilt in a contrasting stone from the original and with concrete copings, Derryola Bridge is of architectural and historic interest as a local example of a small-arched bridge in the flat rural landscape that surrounds Lough Neagh.

General Comments

Date of Survey

03 October 2018