Tower Bridge as its northern landfall is in Tower Hamlets. The bridge consists of two bridge towers tied together at the upper level by two horizontal walkways, designed to withstand the horizontal tension forces exerted by the suspended sections of the bridge on the landward sides of the towers. The vertical components of the forces in the suspended sections and the vertical reactions of the two walkways are carried by the two robust towers. The bascule pivots and operating machinery are housed in the base of each tower. Before its restoration in the 2010s, the bridge's colour scheme dated from 1977, when
London Bridge Is Falling Down children in the foundations of the bridge was first advanced by Alice Bertha Gomme (later Lady Gomme) in "The Traditional Games of England, Scotland and Ireland" (1894–1898) and perpetuated by the usually sceptical Iona and Peter Opie. This was based around the idea that a bridge would collapse unless the body of a human sacrifice was buried in its foundations and that the watchman is actually a human sacrifice, who will then watch over the bridge. However, there is no archaeological evidence for any human remains in the foundations of London Bridge. Until the mid-eighteenth century the Old London Bridge