Regular readers of TBTP know that I am a hopeless Londonphile. I love the city and its wonderfully quirky traditions. So I was tickled to see a story about workers on London's Millennium Bridge hanging a bale of straw under the structure due to the triggering of an ancient bylaw. Repair works to the footbridge mean straw must be dangled to warn oncoming boats of the work going on beneath it. The bale, which these days is lowered on climbing rope by workers, is intended to alert river traffic of the reduced headroom.
Due to necessary repair and cleaning work the bridge has been closed for three weeks, until November 5th. According to the Port of London Thames Byelaws, clause 36.2: "When the headroom of an arch or span of a bridge is reduced from its usual limits, but that arch or span is not closed to navigation, the person in control of the bridge must suspend from the centre of that arch or span by day a bundle of straw large enough to be conspicuous and by night a white light."
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