If you're travelling along the A55, also known as the North Wales Expressway, and cast your eyes out your car window, you may be surprised to see a cycle path on a section of what used to be the A55. Back in 1826, Scottish civil engineer Thomas Telford built a coast road into the headland above Penmaenmawr in Conwy in an attempt to make it easier for post to be transported to Holyhead.
For more than a century, Telford's coast road was the main route between Conwy and Bangor - but now sits beneath landslide barriers. Years prior, the striking Penmaenmawr mountain was a difficult obstacle for travellers to have to get around - and whilst an old route did exist around the headland, it was perilous.
The old path hugged the contours of the mountain and was often blocked by fallen rubble. Numerous travellers tripped over loose rocks and, as there was no guard wall, many plunged to their deaths, as reported by NorthWalesLive. "Nothing could be more terrific or more hazardous than the pass over this mountain, in which one false step was attended with certain destruction," one fearful traveller wrote at the time.
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Due to the dangers of the route around the mountain, some pedestrians and horse riders preferred to try their luck navigating over the sands at low tide, to get around the headland. Carriages were few and far between - even the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland travelled this way, much to the surprise of locals.
And there were other challenges facing people travelling this way. As upper-class traveller, William Williams of Llandegai wrote at the time: "Travellers to and from Holyhead were obliged to hire guides from the Head to Chester, which commonly were a set of drunken fellows; and ladies of quality were obliged to sit on a kind of pillion behind these folks in their passage thro’ Wales."
Interestingly, whilst engineer Thomas Telford is credited for building the road, the real hero was an unsung engineer called John Sylvester. In 1772, the UK Parliament sanctioned improvements and a public subscription raised £2,000. John Sylvester used this money, and his extensive understanding of engineering, to direct workers to cut through solid rock - in order to widen the old path around the mountain in several places, so that carriages could travel and pass safely.
The improved pass was an immediate success. One writer recorded that it was the "pride of the nation" and had attracted the "admiration of foreigners". It was this route that Telford subsequently modified and enhanced, and which endured for a century.
Another impressive construction followed in the 1840s when English civil engineer Robert Stephenson built a parallel viaduct and tunnel to carry the new Chester and Holyhead Railway, paving the way for mass tourism and for people to be able to visit Penmaenmawr town easily, making it a popular holiday resort.
But rocks from the headland continued to fall on the road so when motorised transport began to take off, an alternative route was needed. From 1930 to 1936, two seaward Pen-y-clip road tunnels were built beneath Telford's road, one at 180ft in length and the other at 100ft in length.
Both tunnels served at the western end by a seven-arch viaduct coinciding with highest point of the old road. To counteract movement of the mountainside, the viaduct's piers were sunk 31ft into the ground.
The new road was formally opened in October 1935 - though it wasn't actually completed until 1936. But when it did, scores of people came to watch the first traffic travelling through!
The oldest part of the old road that still survives to this day is the Penmaenbach tunnel, located just east of the Giant's Thumb headland at the foot of Conwy mountain. Constructed in 1932, to its seaward side is a pedestrian and cycle route constructed on what was another section of Telford’s original road.
Building Penmaenbach tunnel wasn’t without mishap. Workers were brought in from across North Wales, many of them coal miners forced out of jobs by the Great Depression. Two reportedly lost their lives during construction, sparking an enduring tradition among motorists to "beep-beep" in the tunnels in their memory – one for each man.
Originally, the Penmaenbach and Pen-y-clip tunnels were built for two-way traffic, later forming the eastbound dual carriageway after new westbound tunnels were opened in 1993. At the time, the new Pen-y-clip tunnel was the longest road tunnel in Britain.
Now, as it passes through the mountain, the new tunnel goes underneath Telford’s old coastal road - which people can actually walk along to soak in spectacular views. It's actually part of National Cycle Route 5, although most cyclists avoid the hill by using the road-level pavement.
In 2009 two foot-cycle bridges were added to to each end of the old road, enabling users to cross over the A55 without risking life and limb. The white bridges did not add to the aesthetics of the increasingly congested complex. Nor did they appease horse riders, as they are not suitable for their horses.
Despite the bridges either side of Telford’s old road, pedestrians don't always use them, preferring instead to use the illegal but much quicker route through the new Pen-y-clip tunnel. Transport bosses have taken a dim view of this practice, threatening to prosecute anyone they find walking alongside the busy dual carriageway.
Few motorists passing through the Pen-y-clip tunnels will spare a thought for the area’s incredible engineering feats of the past 250 years. Only from the sea can the majesty of the work be fully appreciated.
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