Latouche Bridge

Single-arch bridge, dated 1791, carrying road over circular line of Grand Canal. Segmental-headed arch having dressed granite voussoirs and soffits. Splayed dressed limestone abutment walls terminating in dressed limestone battered piers. Splayed dressed limestone wing walls, having cut granite stringcourse and coping. Inscribed date plaques to outer (east and west) elevations of wing walls. Cut granite piers with pointed caps flanking cast-iron panels having round-headed vertical balustraded parapets. Central lamp standards to balustrades with cast-iron barley-sugar posts and circular heads. Located to east of Portobello Harbour, north of Rathmines Road.

This elegant and well-composed bridge exhibits good quality masonry, enlivened by granite detailing. Splayed wing walls contribute to a strong sense of symmetry. The later cast-iron balustrades, which attest to skilled artisanship, provide a foil to the granite and limestone construction, and are characteristic of late nineteenth-century ironworking. The canal originally terminated at the City Basin off James's Street, and the Circular Line, connecting the system with the Grand Canal Docks at Ringsend, was only completed in the 1790s. One of a number of masonry arch bridges built to carry the road across it, this bridge was named after William Digges LaTouche, of the Huguenot banking family. In the late nineteenth century the cast-iron balustrades were added and a flat deck replaced the humpback form, possibly to accommodate the running of trams to Rathmines. The canal network developed in the late eighteenth century and encouraged the commercialization and industrialization of the country. This composition, forming a group with the adjacent canal lock, is an important reminder of Ireland's civil engineering heritage.