Bridges

Old Town Bridge

The Old Town Bridge bridges the Ploučnice River near its mouth to the Elbe. Surprisingly, it stands in place of its older, also stone predecessor, demolished in 1561 by a flood. The one you can walk on today was built in 1574 on the old road connecting Děčín with the Elbe ford.

The construction was carried out by the builder S. Hölle and the master stonemason H. Franck. The bridge is made of sandstone blocks, a distinctive element is the gothic tooth-cut railing. In the middle of the bridge stands a rich sculpture from the workshop of the important Baroque sculptor M. J. Brokof, which was created in 1714. The sculpture is supposed to represent three Czech patrons - St. Vitus, St. Wenceslas and St. John of Nepomuk. On the base of the sculpture, created by J. B. Santini-Aichl, there are reliefs depicting the martyrdom of these saints. The sculpture also includes Jan Nepomucký in the confessional.

The bridge has undergone a number of repairs, a significant reconstruction took place in 1985 and further after the floods in 2002. For a long time the bridge served as a road bridge, nowadays it is used as a footbridge for pedestrians and cyclists.

Chain gangway

Part of the romantic modifications of the castle garden was the breaking of the castle rock (the so-called tunnel, between 1808 - 1810) and later the bridging of the embankment (outlet) from the Castle Mill by a chain footbridge about 30 m long. The footbridge was built between 1829 and 1831, making it the oldest historic suspension bridge structure in the country. Moreover, it remains the only structure of its kind to have been preserved in its original location.

The supporting chains of the footbridge structure are embedded in the rock on one side (the anchorage points used to be decorated with metal lion heads), on the other side they are led through a portal made of sandstone blocks. Today the bridge is an important technical monument. However, no restrictions apply to it, the chain bridge is freely accessible to pedestrians and cyclists and is a great connection between Smetana Embankment and Marianska Meadow.

Sheep Bridge

The Sheep Bridge is a Renaissance stone bridge from 1561, which spans the Jílovský Brook. The name and the origin of the bridge is connected with an ancient legend. It is said that a member of the local knightly family, Günther of Bünau, approached the surrounding peasants to participate in the construction. They refused, so Günther had the bridge heavily arched to prevent wagons from passing over it. But the real reason for its unusual one-and-a-half-metre-high bend is much more practical. It was to protect the bridge from the floods that occasionally swept through the Jílovský Brook. Until the 19th century, it was the only bridge over the Jílovský Brook in this then completely peripheral part of Podmokel.

Tyrš Bridge

Steel bridge with 70,000 rivets replaced the Empress Elizabeth Chain Bridge in 1933. It was built in 1855, when Děčín urgently needed a reliable connection with Podmokly on the left bank of the Elbe, where the railway line from Prague to Dresden (completed in 1851) passed at that time.

With the advent of car traffic, the chain bridge ceased to be technically and capacityally suitable. For cost-saving reasons, a modern steel structure on modified piers of the original bridge was chosen as a replacement. The contract for the construction was awarded in a public tender to the joint-stock company Škoda Plzen. The construction of the bridge proceeded essentially without interruption of traffic.

The actual move to the final position took place on 9 December 1933. At 8 a.m., traffic was stopped on the bridge and within four hours the entire bridge was moved and settled by hand gates in freezing temperatures of -16°C. In the afternoon of the same day the bridge was officially opened and put into operation. The bridge was named in honour of Dr. Miroslav Tyrš, a native of Děčín. At the time of its opening, the Tyrš Bridge was the largest of its kind in Czechoslovakia. Today the Tyrš Bridge is one of the main landmarks of Děčín.