Work has started on Nelson Monument in Edinburgh in a bid to return the 32-metre high building to its former glory and reopen it to the public. The monument has graced the Edinburgh skyline for more than two centuries on Calton Hill but has been closed for the majority of the last four years. It initially shut in 2020 due to Covid but didn’t reopen until earlier this year for a planned event after some works had taken place.
Now it is shut again with more essential works ongoing, including the restoration of the historic time ball. The Nelson Monument was designed by Robert Burn to resemble an upside-down telescope and was completed in 1815 to commemorate Vice Admiral Horatio Nelson’s death and the British victory over French and Spanish naval fleets at the Battle of Trafalgar. A time ball was added in the 1850s by Astronomer Royal, Professor Charles Pizzi Smyth, to help sailors in the Firth of Forth keep time and navigate accurately.
It was previously synchronised with the one o’clock gun at Edinburgh castle but has been out of service since falling into disrepair. The time ball (Image: Handout) It is now hoped the Nelson monument, which is managed by Museums and Galleries Edinburgh, will reopen later in 2024 following structural fabric assessment and restoration works to be carried out by civil and structural engineering firm Will Rudd. Stuart Fleming, a director of the company and leading the works, said: “As a structural engineer, with great interest in historic b.