Thursday, August 5, 2021

1932+1974 Bridges over Mississippi River at Prairie du Chien, WI and Marquette, IA

1932 US-18: (Bridge Hunter)
1974 US-18: (Bridge Hunter; John A. Weeks III; Satellite)
1870 Railroad: (Satellite, the lower abandoned railroad. I think the upper line was the 1932 bridge.)

Don Traut posted two photos with the comment:
Prarie Du Chien WI pontoon swing bridge over the Mississippi. Built in the 1870s and in use until 1960, dismantled in 1961. Quite an interesting operation.
[There was a pontoon bridge in both the east and west channels.]
1
[In the lower-left corner is the top of a tower of the 1932-1974 suspension bridge mentioned by John Weeks.]

2

Henry Peter Bosse, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Dennis DeBruler commented on Don's post
1932 Prairie Du Chien Quadrangle @ 1:62,500

Michael Bohme commented on Don's post
a possible round house location in Marquette for the rail yard?

Dennis DeBruler commented on Michael's comment
 I think so. The road has moved, but the circle seems to be in the correct location.
1967 Prairie Du Chien Quadrangle @ 1:62,500

BridgeHunter-74
The pontoon swing bridge in the foreground was the only bridge of its kind in the country at the time.

Sara Neave, Oct 2018
[This is a photo of a display in the Marquette Museum.]

Roger W Flickr via BridgeHunter-32, License: Creative Commons Attribution-Share-Alike (CC BY-SA)
This is actually one of two suspension bridges across the Mississippi River, from Prairie du Chien to Marquette, Iowa. The other one is on the Iowa side, and spans the main channel The bridge was completed in 1932. It was a toll bridge, 90 cents per car. There was a promise that the toll would be removed once construction costs were covered. That promise was kept in 1954.

BridgeHunter-74

BridgeHunter-74
"The original Prairie du Chien, Marquette bridge. A $1,000,000 suspension bridge, total length 3729 feet, the only suspension bridge on the Mississippi River, open for traffic 1932, dedicated June 9-10-11, 1932."

JohnWeeks
[This is another tied-arch bridge that has had problems.]
"It was closed for two years starting in 1981 due to problems with the large metal beams."

"In the winter after its opening, the bridge developed several cracks and had to be closed for repair." [academic, wikipedia]

The length of the tied-arch span is 462.3'.  Ben Roethig comments in Bridge Hunter-74 that the east channel has a navigation span of 350' using a box girder.
Street View

Spring 2023 flood:
3:53 video @ 1:05

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