The present bridge, joining Chelsea Bridge Road and Queenstown Road, was opened 06/05/1937 by a non-royal king, the Rt Hon. W.L. MacKenzie King, Prime Minister of Canada. Its cost, at some £223,000, was some £90,000 less than the amount of the tender by its constructors They were Holloway Brothers Limited, employed by the London County Council to work to the designs of the Council's engineers (led by Sir Peirson Frank) with consultancy from Messrs Rendel, Tritton and Palmer. The time of its building was a result of the adoption of Keynesian policies of funding public works to reduce unemployment. Its building had been strongly advocated by a Royal Commission in 1926. The materials with which it is built were determinedly resourced from Great Britain and its Empire. The Prime Minister walked on a roadway of Canadian Douglas Fir pine blocks topped by asphalt from Trinidad and supported by British steel encased by British granite. The pre-fabricated steel sections of the carriageway were floated into position on barges at high, spring tides, jacked onto a framework and then the barges allowed to drop away (the tide was used similarly for the construction of Barnes railway bridge in the 1890's). A reason for this placement of the carriageway was that, in this bridge's construction, the suspension stresses are resolved by the stiffening of the platform rather than the tension on the cables to their anchorage in the abutments. So the suspension cables were strung across the towers, which rise 55 ft above the road, after the carriageway was in place.
This bridge replaced, over vehement protestations, that which had been authorised by parliament in 1846 and opened in March 1858. The building of that was initiated by the recommendation of the Commissioners for Woods and Forests along with their recommendations for the embankment of the river along Chelsea Reach. The designs for a 333 ft span suspension bridge were drawn by Thomas Page and had, apparently, distinctly gothic aspects. Its popular name for some years was Victoria Bridge. Its costs were anticipated to be £95,000 but a further £11,000 was required for strengthening works quite shortly after its opening. The Metropolitan Board of Works paid £75,000 for the structure in 1877 and deemed it necessary to further strengthen it. The suspension was effected, initially, by pairs of chains linked by rods to the side girders of the carriageway. The chains were carried over the towers 57 ft above the roadway and reportedly weighed 340 tons. It was particularly they and the rods which had to be strengthened to meet the demands of the increases in the weight of traffic.

O/S Co-ords:2857.7780
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Thames Crossings. Bridges, Tunnels and Ferries