The tilt
Around 850 tonnes rotate through 40 degrees in four minutes; the world's first tilting bridge, and still its most famous.
Newcastle calls it the bridge that winks. When a tall boat needs to pass, the white steel arch over the Tyne does not lift or split in the middle: the whole thing, some 850 tonnes of it, rotates on its axis through 40 degrees in about four minutes, so that the deck you were walking on a moment ago swings up into the air and the arch that carried it swings down to meet it, the two curves closing like an eyelid. It opened in 2001 as the world's first tilting bridge, took the Stirling Prize the following year along with more than twenty other awards, and earned every one of them. The thing to know before you go: it does not tilt on the hour, or even every day. Gateshead Council publishes demonstration times on its website; in recent seasons these have been short lunchtime tilts on set days through the summer months, and the timetable changes from year to year. The rest of the year it moves only for a passing vessel, which is rare. Check the council's page before promising your children anything, and if you miss it, do not mourn. The walk itself, on a gently curved deck above the river with the great green Tyne Bridge behind you and Newcastle's chain of older bridges stacked up the river beyond it, is worth the detour on its own. The deck is completely flat and step-free, so pushchairs and wheelchairs cross without effort, and the cycle lane runs at a separate level from the footway. On the Gateshead side you land at BALTIC, the free contemporary art centre whose upper floors give the finest view of the bridge there is, and at The Glasshouse concert hall; on the Newcastle side is the Quayside with its cafes and the Sunday market that spreads out beneath the Tyne Bridge each week. The classic photograph is taken from the Newcastle Quayside, with the white arch framed against the Tyne Bridge's arch behind it. After dark the bridge is lit, white on weekdays and in shifting colours at weekends. In summer the light lingers past ten in the evening and photography is easy; in winter it is dark before four and the wind off the river bites, so dress for it and plan a short visit rather than a long one.
Around 850 tonnes rotate through 40 degrees in four minutes; the world's first tilting bridge, and still its most famous.
From Newcastle Quayside the white arch lines up with the Tyne Bridge behind it; at weekends it is lit in colour after dark.
A free contemporary art centre whose upper-floor terraces hold the best view of the bridge and river in the city.
South Shore Road, Gateshead Quays
Yes, if you are already in Newcastle: it is a fifteen-minute walk from Central Station and sits in the prettiest part of the city. But do not travel to Newcastle for the bridge alone. For the full show, go on one of the demonstration days the council lists on its page, mostly summer lunchtimes, and give the whole area, bridge, BALTIC and the Sunday market, half a day.
Entirely. The deck is flat without a single step, the railings are high, and children are usually more thrilled by the rotating bridge than the adults are. The only problem is the river wind in winter, so keep the visit short then.