| Town Bridge |
 |  |

Halstead's Town Bridge has been rebuilt many times to enable it to cope with the constantly changing traffic conditions. Here we see the late Victorian version photographed around 1908. London House was Dunt's Drapers Shop (later Simmons) until it was demolished in the 1960's to make way for a new row of shops. The building on the extreme right of the picture was Carters Sweet Shop at the entrance to the Old Tan Yard. It was taken down in 1911 to allow a wider entrance to Courtaulds factory. The way in had previously been by way of Factory Lane East but with the coming of the motor lorry it was found to be too narrow, as, in fact, the new entrance was by the 1980's. The bridge has been reconstructed and widened twice in the present century. Will it fail us again?