Ballaugh Bridge, Road bridge on A3 highway in Ballaugh, Isle of Man.
Ballaugh Bridge is a hump-backed road bridge over the Ravensdale River in Ballaugh village, on the A3 Castletown to Ramsey road. It carries the road over the water and is the only remaining hump-backed bridge on the Isle of Man TT Course.
Ballaugh Bridge lay on the 52.15-mile Highland Course and the 37.50-mile Four Inch Course used for the 1904 Gordon Bennett Trial and the RAC Tourist Trophy between 1905 and 1922. It formed the western edge of the Sandygate Loop. In 1911 the Auto-Cycling Union adopted the Four Inch Course for the Isle of Man TT, later the 37.73-mile Mountain Course. The bridge was widened and reprofiled in the winter of 1953/1954 for the 1954 TT, removing a garden wall of the adjacent Ballaugh Railway Hotel.
Ballaugh Bridge is the only remaining hump-backed bridge on the TT Course, after Sulby Bridge went in the 1920s and Ballig Bridge in 1935. Riders still launch off its hump each year during the Isle of Man TT and, from 1923, the Manx Grand Prix. Near the bridge stands a roadside memorial to Karl Gall, a pre-war works BMW rider who died of injuries from a crash there during evening practice for the 1939 TT.
The best time to visit this location is during the TT racing event when viewing areas near the crossing are set up for spectators. The Raven pub nearby offers refreshments and a convenient place to rest between viewing periods.
This crossing remains the last surviving hump-backed structure on the racing circuit after similar bridges were removed from the course decades ago. It preserves this unusual feature that makes it a final remnant of its kind on the track.
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