Garth Pier, Bangor
This pier, which retains its intricate Victorian ironwork, was opened in 1896 by Lord Penrhyn. The old photo on the right, taken from Anglesey, shows the end of the pier near the top right corner.
The pier was designed by London-based engineer JJ Webster and cost £17,000 to construct. Its primary purpose was to enable steamships from Liverpool and other places to bring passengers to Bangor. A narrow-gauge railway carried passengers’ luggage along the pier’s 472-metre length. Smaller vessels shuttled between Garth Pier and Llandegfan or Beaumaris, on the opposite side of the Menai Strait.
The pier, unusually, was not altered by the addition of theatres and other entertainment facilities. However, it was damaged when a cargo ship collided with it in 1914. The Royal Anglesey Royal Engineers built a temporary bridge between the undamaged sections. The photo, courtesy of Peter Brindley, shows them on the temporary structure. Permanent repairs had to await the end of the First World War.
Sapper Lionel Hemingway, who did “a tremendous lot of work” on the repair, drowned along with Sapper Samuel Hill on 9 May 1915 after rough weather disrupted a boating trip on the Menai Strait. Both are buried at Beaumaris Cemetery.
In 1927-28 Philip White, professor of zoology at Bangor University, set up a small marine laboratory in one of the pier kiosks, which he rented from the Corporation of Bangor. He had been trying to develop marine biological studies in Bangor since the 1890s. He reported that he was having difficulty in carrying his plan through at the pier, shortly before he died suddenly in December 1929. His successor, Prof Francis William Rogers Brambell, launched the university’s first Marine Zoology course in 1932. Today Bangor is a renowned centre of marine science.
Garth Pier’s condition deteriorated in the 1960s and it closed to the public in 1971. In the mid-1970s Arfon Borough Council, then owner of the pier, decided the pier should be demolished. Bangor City Community Council bought the pier in 1978 for just 1p. In 1982 a restoration project began, with funding from the National Heritage Memorial Fund, Manpower Services Commission and Welsh Office.
The pier reopened to the public in 1988 and is considered one of Britain’s most unspoilt Victorian piers. Bangor City Council remains its owner. Ships can no longer berth alongside.
With thanks to Adrian Hughes of the Home Front Museum, Llandudno, to David Roberts of Bangor University and Peter Brindley
Postcode: LL57 2SW View Location Map