THEY were loved and loathed in equal measure and were wonderfully quirky and were a unique feature of Southampton life for decades.

The Floating Bridges clanked their way back and forwards over the Itchen providing a vital link between Woolston and the communities to the east of the city with “town” on the other side of the river.

For 141 years a Floating Bridge of some sort was used on the crossing and it became so well known that the painter L S Lowry featured the ferry in his work and in 1977 a folk song, still sung locally to this day, praised these ungainly workhorses of the Itchen.

Originally sung by Gutta Percha and the Balladeers the lyrics included the lines: “Oh, the Woolston Ferry doesn’t travel very fast, “It was never built for comfort, it was built to last.”

Each day, from first thing in the morning to late at night, thousands of people and countless cars, vans and bicycles squeezed on board for the short crossing.

In the daily rush hours battalions of workers swarmed on to the Floating Bridges as they headed for the docks in one direction while another army headed the other way to the Thornycroft shipyard.

However, in October, 1956 a problem connected with the Floating Bridge emerged involving the unusual combination of hungry swans and the then mayor of Southampton, Alderman Kitty Cawte.

There were growing concerns that passengers on the Floating Bridges were feeding swans, which were then being injured.

“How graceful they appear with their long white necks in pleasing postures, and their long black legs and feet gently paddling beneath the water; the Floating Bridge swans certainly add charm to the tideway,” said the Daily Echo at the time.

“But at last month’s meeting of the Southampton branch of the RSPCA the mayor, Alderman Cawte suggested that notices might be erected warning people not to feed the swans from the bridge because the birds were getting crushed as the ferries grounded on either shore.”

The RSPCA took the matter up with the Corporation, which then fitted four notices on both ferries.

The Daily Echo reported: “These ask the travelling public not to attract the birds near the bridge by feeding them.

“It is not suggested that people should desist from feeding the swans, but if they do so should perform this interesting pastime from the shore, so that the swans are clear of the hawsers and the prows of the bridges.

“The Floating Bridge swans, anything up to 100 birds on the two shores is not unusual, but if their lives can be safeguarded by passengers refraining from feeding them one feels sure that the travelling public will co-operate.” The Floating Bridge could trace its history back to November 23, 1836 when the first ferry came into operation, with the service continuing up to June, 1977 when the new Itchen toll was opened.

Initially there was only one ferry built and owned by the Floating Bridge Company but this increased to two in 1881 and in 1934 they were sold to Southampton Corporation.

By the 1970s, these ferries were operating side by side during the day and reducing to a single ferry late in the evening.

There was a bus terminus at either side of the crossing, connecting foot passengers with the centre of Southampton and the road to Portsmouth.