Nether Bridge shuts to all vehicles for up to five days from Monday 12 October while the parapet demolished in June is rebuilt. Diversion via Romney Bridge.

Nether Bridge will be closed to all vehicles from Monday 12 October for a maximum of five days, the council has announced. The closure runs 24 hours a day, not just in working hours.

The work is the permanent repair of a 10-metre section of the southern parapet wall, demolished in a traffic incident in June. Westmorland and Furness Council published the dates on 9 September.

The council says a running lane cannot be kept open. The site is confined, and the work needs site vehicles, an underbridge access unit, masonry materials and mixing equipment on the deck at the same time. Between them they take up most of the carriageway.

What is shut, and how to get round it

  • Vehicles: the bridge is closed in both directions, day and night, for up to five days from Monday 12 October.
  • The signed diversion runs via Romney Bridge and Milnthorpe Road.
  • HGVs get extra signs keeping them off Parkside Road, because of the 13ft 3in height restriction at the railway bridge there.
  • Pedestrians and cyclists keep the bridge throughout, using the northern footway.
  • The southern footway stays shut for several weeks after the road reopens. Covers have to protect the new stonework while the mortar cures, and they obstruct that footway.

That last point is the one most likely to catch people out. The road comes back after five days. The pavement on the south side does not.

Why the repair has taken until October

The bridge was damaged early on the morning of Wednesday 17 June. An out-of-hours crew made the structure safe, assessed it, placed concrete barriers and reopened the road the same morning. About 10 metres of parapet wall had been displaced, and heritage stonework had gone into the river.

On Monday 22 June the bridge shut from 9.30am to about 2pm so a truck-mounted crane could lift that stone back out of the watercourse, using the same diversion as October’s closure. The council said then that a permanent repair would take months, because it needed a contractor experienced in high-profile heritage work, Environment Agency consent and Natural England assent (announcement of 19 June).

The reason for those consents is what the bridge is. Nether Bridge is a scheduled ancient monument, protected under the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Areas Act 1979 and recorded by Historic England as list entry 1007110. It spans the River Kent, which is both a Site of Special Scientific Interest and a Special Area of Conservation.

That combination decided the method, and the method decided the date:

  • Working entirely from the bridge deck avoids putting scaffolding in the river channel.
  • Scaffolding in the channel would have needed environmental permitting, and the council says that would have pushed the repair back to the next allowable river working window in summer 2027.
  • October also gives the traditional lime mortar time to cure before the cold sets in.
  • Where possible the original stone recovered in June will be reused, supplemented by locally sourced stone.

Councillor Peter Thornton, cabinet member for highways and ICT, said: “We recognise that these works will cause some inconvenience to road users and local residents. However, these measures are necessary to ensure the safety of the workforce, bridge users, and the travelling public while the repairs are undertaken.”

Nether Bridge: from damage to repair A timeline of four dates. On 17 June 2026 about 10 metres of the southern parapet was displaced in an incident overnight, and the road reopened the same morning behind concrete barriers. On 22 June 2026 the bridge closed from 9.30am to about 2pm while a crane lifted the fallen heritage stone out of the River Kent. On 12 October 2026 the bridge closes to all vehicles, 24 hours a day, for a maximum of five days, with a diversion via Romney Bridge and Milnthorpe Road. For several weeks after the road reopens the southern footway stays closed while covers protect the curing lime mortar. Nether Bridge: four months from damage to repair Source: Westmorland and Furness Council announcements, 19 June and 9 September 2026. 17 June Parapet hit 10m displaced road reopens same morning 22 June Stone lifted from the river 9.30am to 2pm 12 October Closed to vehicles 24 hours a day, up to five days diversion: Romney Bridge After that Southern footway stays shut for several weeks Graphic by Kendal News
Every date here comes from the council's own two announcements. The five-day closure is a maximum, not a fixed run.

What it means for you

  • If you drive over Nether Bridge on the school run or the commute, plan for Romney Bridge and Milnthorpe Road for that week. The closure is round the clock, so there is no early-morning window as there was in June.
  • If you walk the south side of the bridge, expect to be crossing to the northern footway for weeks after the road itself reopens.
  • If you drive anything tall, do not follow a satnav down Parkside Road to avoid the closure. The railway bridge there is 13ft 3in.
  • If you are booking a delivery or a trade visit for the week of 12 October, say which side of the river you are on when you book it.

Two things are not settled. The council has not published a contractor, a cost or a start time of day for the October closure. And when we checked the Public Notice Portal on 12 September, no temporary traffic regulation order had yet been advertised for it. The legal notice normally appears within a fortnight of the work, and the order is where the diversion is published in full.

We track every advertised closure in the district on our Kendal roadworks and travel page, which also carries the M6 junction 36 night closures and the A591 order that starts on 14 September. For where to leave the car on the other side of the river, see parking in Kendal.