The Regent Bridge

I've often though that, although leaving Waverly station through the main exit - up the steps on to Princes Street - is all fine and well, the exit on to Calton Road offers a somewhat grander and more impressive view, namely that of Regent Bridge.

Designed by architect Archibald Elliot, the bridge was proposed in 1814, work started in 1816, and was finished and officially opened in 1819 during the visit of Prince Leopold of Saxe Coburg. The street crossing the bridge, Waterloo Place, was laid in 1815, and named after the battle of the same name.

Interestingly, the bridge was constructed as part of a new, elegant means of entry to the city, with the old entry via London Road seen as cumbersome, narrow and inconvenient. The new road was intended to connect straight through to Princes Street, and today Waterloo Place is the beginning (or end) of the longest numbered road in the UK, namely the A1.