Tower Bridge Tickets

Horace Jones designed and John Wolfe Barry engineered London’s Tower Bridge in the late 1800s. The complexity of this design, with its two pedestrian walkways, movable roadways that lift to let ships pass through, and namesake towers, meant the structure took almost a decade to complete.

Since then, millions have driven or walked over it, and a lucky few have gotten an inside look at its mechanics and inner workings. Tower Bridge was initially created to provide further access to the East End of London. Still, today its purpose has expanded: it attracts visitors worldwide to take in this architectural marvel.

Go where few commuters ever do, and see in the engine rooms how the structure was built and what makes it an architectural feat decades and decades after its initial construction. A few bridges this famous also raise themselves to let ships pass, making Tower Bridge a locomotive spectacle.

What to Watch For

• Since 1982, Tower Bridge Exhibition has told the bridge's history and why it came into existence. Visitors can also experience the exciting new glass floor and spectacular panoramic views from the high-level Walkways and the Victorian engine rooms, which house the beautiful steam engines that once powered the bridge lifts.
• Fifty designs were rejected before the right one was greenlit. In 1877, Sir Albert Joseph Altman formed a special committee to begin the bridge-building process; more than 50 designs were submitted. A design was not approved for eight years when it was decided to build a bascule bridge.