The New Speybridge was built in 1931 to replace the ancient Old Speybridge a little further downstream, which was built in the 1750s as part of the Military Road from Perth to Fort George on the Moray Firth. It is, as most bridges built in the Highlands in the 1930s were, a Concrete S2 structure with pedestrian footways. The single span is a very shallow arch to remove the need for any supports in the river and yet minimise the gradient required on the road. This also allows the river to pass through unobstructed when in Spate.
The piers on either bank rise up in semi-circular drums to form pedestrian refuges at the four corners of the structure, the stonework of the parapets being replaced with panelled concrete sections. Beyond these, the parapets curve out as wing walls, terminating at square concrete blocks topped with shallow pyramids. At the centre of the crossing, another concrete panel in the parapet carries brass plaques on either side. One is the date'stone', the other marks the boundary between Inverness-shire and Moray. On the outside of the parapets, below these panels and acting as decorative keystones, are two large panels bearing the date '1931'.
Today, as always, the bridge carries the A95 / A939multiplex south from Grantown, with the two routes meeting at the roundabout at the north end of the bridge since the very short Grantown bypass was built in the 1980s. Before this, the multiplex between the two routes started further north in Grantown itself. The bypass, although only half a mile long, therefore cut off a lengthy, and slow detour through the town, just as the bridge had removed a slow section of road along the riverbank and over the narrow old bridge half a century before.
