Trail/lawsuit/UP/Katy (MKT) Bridges over Missisouri River at Boonvilee, MO

(1874 Bridge Hunter, 1896 Bridge Hunter, 1932 Bridge Hunter, no Historic Bridges, John Marvig, Satellite)

1932 Bridge Hunter has a timeline of the saving of this bridge. Of note, the MO AG sued the MO DNR director to not give the bridge back to UP. UP wanted to move some of the spans to another project.

The rails-to-trails web-presence

Wayne Lammers posted four photos with the comment:

Hi. I'm a new member to this FB page. These are some of my Boonville, MO Katy (MKT) railroad bridge collection. This bridge was built and finished in1873. It was changed over the years and was given to the city of Boonville. We are presently converting it to be a large part of the Missouri Katy Trail State Park. If there is interest, I will post more images of our beautiful 408 foot lift span bridge. The last photo is what it looks like now.

1
Construction of the MKT railroad bridge in 1872.

2
This is the south Boonville entrance to the finished, MK&T RR Bridge. Just look how they built bridges back some 145 years ago!!!

3
This is the reconstruction of the bridge in 1886.

4
From the center of the Missouri River at Boonville, MO

(new window)  Shot in 1986. They were still running with cabooses!


(new window)  I shoved the position indicator quite frequently.

Katy Bridge Boonville posted
An awesome image of the bridge during the flood of 1903
Charles Wells Sure looks like "Everything" is under water over at Franklin! Think this was far more a common occurrence than one might imagine, especially during spring and late fall! Too bad the Katy did not build farther up on higher ground!

The US Army Core of Engineers supports a 9-foot channel on the river to Souix City, IA. [USACE] A 2-million pound, 408' long lift span is rather impressive. If it is locked, it would have to be high enough to clear pushboats (towboats). Fortunately, that is not near as high as the old steamboats needed. I have written about preserved lift bridges that have added ramps up to the locked lift span. Of course, I now can't remember where I wrote that. And Google's Blogspot broke the author's search function on April 3, 2018, so I'm not even going to try to find the preserved lift trail.

Looking at some of the elevation shots, this bridge was built for 9-foot channel barge traffic, not steamboats, because the towers are so short. It looks like even fully raised, ramps on the bridge would have to go up just 20 to 30 feet high. It is interesting that I can't find any info on the plans for the lift span. Are they going to hire a state park ranger to operate it or are they going to lock it in the up position and build ramps? The state park system staffing a lift bridge would be a notable preservation, and tourist attraction, option. But if Missouri politicians are as incompetent as Illinois politicians, the state park system won't be funded to do anything noteworthy. (For example, the Illinois state park closed their Tunnel Hill State Trail facility.)