Berwick-upon-Tweed Old Bridge

The Old Bridge, sometimes called the Berwick Bridge or James I Bridge, is the lowest of the three great crossings of the River Tweed at Berwick. Built between 1611 and 1624 in warm red sandstone, it was commissioned by James VI and I after he passed through the town on his way south to claim the English throne and found the earlier wooden bridge inadequate. It has fifteen segmental arches and once carried the Great North Road.

Today the bridge is still open to traffic, though narrow, with pavements on both sides that make for one of the most rewarding short walks in the town. From the middle of the span you get long views up and down the Tweed, taking in Robert Stephenson's Royal Border Bridge to the west and the twentieth-century Royal Tweed Bridge in between.

At the north end the bridge lands you close to Bridge Street and the quayside, a good starting point for the Elizabethan town walls. At the south end you enter Tweedmouth. It is a Grade I listed structure and one of the oldest surviving stone road bridges of its length in England.