Ayrshire bridge most bashed in Scotland

A Dalry bridge is Scotland's most bashed, with 57 lorries hitting the low Beith Road bridge since 2009.

Beith Road bridge in Dalry, Ayrshire. Picture: Network Rail

It’s 16th most struck across the UK with Network Rail launching a new campaign to help HGV drivers from striking railway bridges and causing needless disruption to rail and road users.

The railways suffer almost 2,000 bridge strikes every year costing the taxpayer some £23m in damages and delays across Britain.

In Scotland a bridge bash takes place on average once every two days and the five most struck structures in the country are Beith Road in Dalry (57), Carlisle Road in Cleland (55), A75 Dunragit (50), Cook Street in Glasgow (37) and Greenhills Road in Paisley (37).

Sir Peter Hendy, chairman of Network Rail and a driver of a double decker bus himself, said: “Size does matter when you’re a professional driver in a heavy vehicle. Not knowing the size of your vehicle or load could lead to a serious accident, and the loss of your licence.

“Every incident creates potential delay for tens of thousands of passengers and potential costs for taxpayers, and this is happening multiple times a day.

“It’s only a matter of time before road or rail users are killed as a result of this carelessness; we need professional HGV drivers and their operator employers to get behind and support this campaign to eradicate bridge bashing, which reaches epidemic levels at this time of year.”

The end of October sees a peak in the number of strikes, rising to almost ten per day. Research suggests this could be due to the hour change and increased deliveries ahead of Christmas.