FEATURE
Bridge of sighs – concerns are increasing for the future of the iconic Transporter Bridge.
It’ s like suggesting you take down the Angel of the North, the Eiffel Tower, the Empire State Building or the Taj Mahal. You can’ t.”
Call for action- Mackenzie Thorpe( right) with Tees Business director and Transporter historian Dave Allan. rules, competing priorities and escalating estimates.
Tees Valley mayor Ben Houchen has secured £ 30m of national transport funding, yet even that milestone no longer stretches far. Restoring the bridge to full operational glory is now costed at £ 70m or more. The original pot could stabilise the structure and halt deterioration – but only that. And even then, the funding is ring-fenced for transport projects, not heritage preservation.
Then came another idea: dismantle the Transporter and build a replica for somewhere around £ 20m. A cheaper symbol.
Mackenzie reacts instantly, almost viscerally.
“ What’ s the point? Why would we want a replica when we’ ve got the original? Would the Louvre take away the Mona Lisa and settle for a print of it?”
For him, the Transporter isn’ t simply a useful crossing point or an inconvenience to the balance sheet. It is identity in steel. It is sculpture. It is memory. It is art.
“ I look at it as a sculpture – a piece of art, a piece of amazing engineering,” he says.“ It’ s like the mother of the north. It stands between two towns and holds it all together.”
To understand his dismay, you need only hear him talk about his childhood. Growing up in a house on St Paul’ s Road, the Transporter was the backdrop to adventure – and mischief.
“ Seven or eight of us would go down there when we were as young as nine or 10,” he laughs.“ The bridge gondola would start to move and we’ d run and jump on it without paying. We’ d get to the other side, jump off again and there was no way they would ever catch us! We’ d then walk all the way to Seaton Carew and back before coming back across on the Transporter.”
The bridge was a rite of passage. It embedded itself in his imagination – and it has stayed there, appearing again and again in his work.
“ It’ s a totally different Middlesbrough from what it was even 20 years ago,” he reflects.“ I understand evolution and how things move on, but this is our Transporter Bridge. We must protect it.”
And for him, the root of the problem is clear: the years of drift.
“ It all comes down to a lack of funding and care over the years. It’ s just been neglected,” he says.“ My message to those who are responsible is: you’ ve bust it, now fix it.”
His message is clear. Not patch up. Not mimic. Not replace. Fix.
“ It’ s priceless. All that history behind it, so I vote to repair it.”
And until someone listens, he argues, the region must not go quiet.
“ We should keep shouting about it until we get the right answers.”
The Transporter Bridge has stood over the Tees since 1911, its silhouette visible for miles, a constant amid change. A century of industry, decline, reinvention and debate has swept beneath its span. It has become a shorthand for Teesside itself – hard working, resilient, flawed, proud and made of steel.
For Mackenzie Thorpe, that symbolism still matters. Perhaps more now than ever.
“ The Transporter Bridge is home,” he says.“ It represents who we are, the community, our strength and our pride. It’ s part of us, our identity. I meet people from all around the world who know what the Transporter Bridge is. It’ s an icon. Losing it would be another part of our culture and history lost forever.”
And so the artist whose work is steeped in Teesside’ s soul has thrown down a challenge to remember who we are. A challenge to refuse the“ unthinkable”.
Because to Mackenzie, the Transporter Bridge is not just a structure, it is the beating heart of a place that taught him who he is. And he is not prepared to see that heart stop.
The voice of business in the Tees region | 61