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Leigh Woods, Somerset

Bristol geography stubsSomerset geography stubsVillages in North Somerset
St Mary the Virgin Church, Leigh Woods
St Mary the Virgin Church, Leigh Woods

Leigh Woods is a village in the North Somerset district of Somerset, United Kingdom. It is just outside the boundary of the city and county of Bristol. The village is located to the south of Leigh Woods National Nature Reserve. It is situated at the western end of the Clifton Suspension Bridge, which opened in 1864, making the development of Leigh Woods as an upmarket residential area practicable. Houses in varying styles were built from the mid-1860s until the First World War. Styles adopted included Italian, neo-Jacobean, Scottish baronial, Swiss chalet, Modern glass buildings, Domestic Revival and Arts and Crafts.The village is in the civil parish of Long Ashton, but in the ecclesiastical parish of Abbots Leigh with Leigh Woods. The church of St Mary the Virgin was designed by the architect John Medland and built in 1891.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Leigh Woods, Somerset (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Leigh Woods, Somerset
Vicarage Road,

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Wikipedia: Leigh Woods, SomersetContinue reading on Wikipedia

Geographical coordinates (GPS)

Latitude Longitude
N 51.453 ° E -2.636 °
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Address

Vicarage Road

Vicarage Road
BS8 3PH
England, United Kingdom
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St Mary the Virgin Church, Leigh Woods
St Mary the Virgin Church, Leigh Woods
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Clifton Suspension Bridge
Clifton Suspension Bridge

The Clifton Suspension Bridge is a suspension bridge spanning the Avon Gorge and the River Avon, linking Clifton in Bristol to Leigh Woods in North Somerset. Since opening in 1864, it has been a toll bridge, the income from which provides funds for its maintenance. The bridge is built to a design by William Henry Barlow and John Hawkshaw, based on an earlier design by Isambard Kingdom Brunel. It is a Grade I listed building and forms part of the B3129 road. The idea of building a bridge across the Avon Gorge originated in 1753. Original plans were for a stone bridge and later iterations were for a wrought iron structure. In 1831, an attempt to build Brunel's design was halted by the Bristol riots, and the revised version of his designs was built after his death and completed in 1864. Although similar in size and design, the bridge towers are not identical, the Clifton tower having side cut-outs, the Leigh tower more pointed arches atop a 110-foot (34 m) red sandstone-clad abutment. Roller-mounted "saddles" at the top of each tower allow movement of the three independent wrought iron chains on each side when loads pass over the bridge. The bridge deck is suspended by 162 vertical wrought-iron rods in 81 matching pairs. The Clifton Bridge Company initially managed the bridge under licence from a charitable trust. The trust subsequently purchased the company shares, completing this in 1949 and took over the running of the bridge using the income from tolls to pay for maintenance. The bridge is a distinctive landmark, used as a symbol of Bristol on postcards, promotional materials, and informational web sites. It has been used as a backdrop to several films and television advertising and programmes. It has also been the venue for significant cultural events such as the first modern bungee jump in 1979, the last Concorde flight in 2003 which flew over the bridge, and a handover of the Olympic Torch relay in 2012.