1913+1976 DCAX+vehicles Hot Metal Escape Bridges over Rouge River at Detroit, MI

1913: (Bridge Hunter)

1976: (Bridge Hunter; no Historic Bridges; Satellite)

DCAX = Delray Connecting Railroad

A 1940 Detroit topo map shows that Detroit, Toledo & Ironton also served Zug Island.

[Historic Bridges presentation, p8-11]

Photo taken by Dale Berry via MichiganRailroads via BridgeHunter-1976, License: Creative Commons Attribution-Share-Alike (CC BY-SA)

 

Street View, Jul 2022

The predecessor bridge looks awfully spindly to have made it into the second half of the 20th Century.

Provided by Peter Dudley on BridgeHunter-1913
The original bridge at this site was completed by Detroit & Lima Northern Railway, a predecessor of Detroit, Toledo & Ironton Railroad, in 1898.
This photograph provides a view downstream, along the "old channel" of the Rouge River, showing Zug Island (right), and an interlocking tower (left). The tower controlled the level crossing of the railroad by Detroit United Railway's West Jefferson Avenue electric interurban line.
A passenger station was built just north of West Jefferson, c. 1923 (Burton Historical Collection photo DPA0116, accessible online from www.DPL.org [link was broke]).

I was looking at several street and Google Earth views to see if this bridge is normally open or closed. (I can't decide if it is normally open or closed because I frequently saw both.) I noticed the exit only sign in this view.

Street View, Nov 2021

But two trucks are clearly entering the island in this view.

Google Earth, Apr 2019

The "EXIT ONLY" sign appears in all of the street views back to Jul 2017. This is the most recent view that does not have the sign. I include the blast furnace because it will be disappearing. And the blue counterweight to the left of the right tower of the pipe bridge is Bridge #141, the only other road access to the island. It is also shared with the railroad.

Street View, Sep 2013

Nolan Skip Raspbury LaFramboise II commented on a post
Go upriver a couple of blocks to the other dual purpose Zug Island bridge, and that's where neighborhood kids would swim in the 1950s and 60s. Delray was a densely populated city in its own right. On one side of that bridge (to the left) were a couple of barge homes - owned by my co-worker at Joey's Stables Restaurant - and on the other side (to the right) was a gas/service station. Both jumping off places for locals, as well as the bridge itself. I know people who water skiied through the original channel. Dare? Challenge? Heaven knows why we do what we do when we're young and immortal..