Tuesday, September 1, 2026

Two pedestrian Bridges over White Lick Creek in Plainfield, IN, and crane operation

North: (Satellite
South: (Satellite, it is too new to be on the map when I published. It is south of the restroom)

Facebook Reel
Scott Tucker: That " crane operator" is rough as a cob.
Kelly Rhudy: Scott Tucker yea cuz that’s an easy job ….

Joe Wallin commented on the above reel, cropped

This YouTube short explains the history of the 1920 truss. He confirms it's a pin-connected truss.

I was surprised how much the bridge was swinging back and forth in the above reel. Scott's comment above indicates I was correct to be surprised. I spent several days watching an LTM 1450-8.1 crane lift steel beams over the building below to construct a commons area in the Downers Grove South courtyard. As you can see, the boom is short, but the luffer jib is long. That luffer configuration allows them to lift the beams over the building and reach the far side of the courtyard by lowering the luffer. Since they use a short radius when hooking up to a beam in the parking lot, the cable is long because of the length of the luffer. It struck me that I never saw the load swing back and forth, even after it was slewed over the building. I watch the lift of several steel beams over the course of several days and every time the hook was lowered over the beam with no pendulum action.
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Then one day I got there early so that I could watch them raise the luffer for the workday. It took about 5 minutes.
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Since they were ready with the crane before the riggers were ready to work, the oiler got some time in the cab for practice. He demonstrated that the hook does want to swing back and forth. And he was unable to stop the pendulum action. When the operator got back in the cab, the hook immediately quit swinging. So, I agree with Kelly that it is hard to learn how to avoid swinging the load. But I agree with Scott, why would an operator that has not learned how to stop the swing be allowed to do an important lift. 
These two screenshots show how much the hook was swinging. It is now clear which object on the parking lot the oiler was aiming for.
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There was already a pedestrian bridge that connected the trails on both sides of the river. But the truss bridge allows them to easily get their lawnmower to the other side of the park.
Street View, Jun 2016 (Satellite)

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