Inside Old London Bridge: How London Built an Entire Neighbourhood on a Bridge

Old London Bridge was more than a river crossing. It was a crowded street where houses, shops and workshops stood directly above the River Thames. CHAPTERS 0:00 London around 1600: a street on a bridge 0:40 Building the stone bridge (1176-1209) 1:02 Nineteen arches, a narrow road 1:37 Building on a tidal river 1:57 Who paid: Bridge House Estates 2:18 Starlings and the rapids 3:03 Shooting the bridge 3:10 Collapses and repairs 3:51 140 houses to rent 4:23 Inside a bridge house (illustrative) 4:54 551 residents and their trades 6:08 Traffic on the bridge 6:48 The chapel and Nonsuch House 7:58 Stone Gate 8:43 Waste, water and the waterworks 9:25 Fire 9:56 Ice and the frost fairs 12:14 How the street ended 13:17 Old London Bridge vs Lake Havasu 13:38 Four answers This documentary reconstruction explores how the medieval stone bridge was built, how nineteen narrow arches affected the river, and how its foundations supported as many as 140 houses. We descend beneath the roadway to examine the stone piers, timber piles and protective starlings that kept the bridge standing in a powerful tidal river. We also follow the people who lived and traded above the water, the rents that helped finance repairs, the dangers faced by boatmen passing through the arches, the fires and collapses that repeatedly damaged the structure, and the eventual disappearance of one of London’s most extraordinary neighbourhoods. Old London Bridge was not simply a bridge. For centuries, it was a living piece of London. 3D RECONSTRUCTION: every scene is a reconstruction based on published research, not footage of the real bridge. Where sources disagree, figures are approximate. Subscribe to The House Knew for 3D cutaway documentaries on the strangest places people lived.