Crews from British Waterways are racing towards the deadline for reopening the bridge, set for the end of this month.

"Basically, the teams are finishing off the superstructure ready for the reopening," said spokesman Guy Lawson.

"The electrical workings of the bridge are being checked over, and there's a small amount of repainting needed on some beams at the top of the frame."

Traffic engineers from Cheshire County Council are also hard at work resurfacing the road deck.

A council spokesman said: "The road is being completely resurfaced, with new road markings being added, too.

"And then our engineers will carry out their own checks on the electrical and mechanical systems on the bridge, just to be sure it's all up to scratch before the reopening."

The bridge was dropped back into place by Europe's largest wheel-mounted crane at around 4.30am last Wednesday morning.

Mr Lawson added: "These are the final stages of a long and sometimes difficult project.

"We're fairly sure that when it opens, people will be seeing it just as it looked when it was first built 100 years ago."

Converted for the new archive on 13 March 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.