Landore Viaduct

The Landore viaduct is a railway viaduct over the Swansea valley and the River Tawe at Landore in south Wales. It provides a link between Swansea city center and the West Wales Line to the South Wales Main Line. The valley crossing provides a panoramic view of Landore, Kilvey Hill, the Liberty Stadium and the Swansea Enterprise Park. The Landore viaduct was constructed as a key element of the West Wales Line during the late 1840s. The structure, which has a length of , was originally designed by the famed engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel, and incorporated a diverse range of structural design elements and was primarily constructed out of timber. It was officially opened to traffic in 1850. The structure was first updated in 1889, using wrought iron for the central span. Between 1978 and 1979, the majority of the viaduct was re decked using steel beams. The structure remains in use to the current day.

During the mid 1840s, work commenced upon the construction of the South Wales Railway, which was being pursued with the goal of connecting Gloucester and the Great Western Railway to key sites throughout South Wales, especially the envisioned ferry traffic at Fishguard, Pembrokeshire. To connect what is now commonly known as the South Wales Main Line with both the Swansea city center and the West Wales Line, it was necessary to construct a crossing of the River Tawe. Following the surveying of the local landscape, it was decided that the optimum site was located around north of the river mouth in Swansea Bay. In order that additional headroom could be provided above the Tawe, a requirement of the Act of Parliament associated with the viaduct's construction, a bowspring truss was used for the largest span over the river to provide a peak height of During this work, the superstructure was reconfigured to a 22 span configuration, which was supported on additional masonry piers. A reduction in the viaduct's length was achieved via the deliberate embanking of the eastern approach using slag from the nearby Hafod Copperworks. A single steel truss was used to replace the original river span, while the remainder were rebuilt using wrought iron. According to an account in the Western Mail published on 5 October 1889, the cost of these alterations came to £30,000. Between 1978 and 1979, the nationalised railway operator British Rail undertook another series of modifications, including the replacement of the wrought iron deck girders with new steel beams. As a result of multiple alterations to the structure, all that survives of Brunel's viaduct are the five original masonry piers located to the west of the Tawe. In addition, several stumps of the timber piers can be found the river bed while some sections of hidden timberwork remain but had been entombed by the 19th century extension of the viaduct's eastern embankment.