That was July 2002 On the victoria day weekend, 2003, I went to check this bridge out, along with some other bridges
This bridge is hidden from view from any roads. Using the areial view I had taken from a plane, topographical map, and a GPS receiver, we set out to check it out. the bridge is about a 2 kilometer walk from where the old rail bed crosses another road.
We reached one end of the bridge via the railway tracks. The bridge is sufficiently isolated from public view, that there was not even any no trespassing signs on it. We did find a barrier that was probably supposed to prevent people from walking over it, but it was dumped in a ditch. My guess is that locals had removed it so they could drive over the bridge with a fourwheeler, or something like that.
Being on the bridge itself turned out to be less rewarding than I thought it would be. It wasn't really dangerous - the railway ties are close enough together that you couldn't fall through them. Still, you can see straight down. Besides that, there isn't much to see from above. All you see is railway ties. I wasn't too comfortable on the bridge myself. Too worried about accidentally dropping something, and having it gonne for good.
The bridge itself looks like it was originally built maybe around the turn of the century. The main construction is riveted steel plates, and fancy lattice work. In addition to that, there is reinforcements that were made to the bridge later on. Each of the longer spans of the bridge was at some point reinforced with another column, made of four I-beams welded together. These look a little crude compared to the intricate iron work on the rest of the bridge. The sets of four I-beams just goes into the ground. I don't know if there is anything on the bottom of them to support the weight, or wether they were just driven directly into the ground. I assume these beams were added to support heavier trains.
The bridge was an awesome find. Without having spotted it from the air, and a GPS to mark the location of where it was, its unlikely we would have ever found this bridge.
Having found it, we were the only ones there. The only other sign of civilization was a farm about a kilometer away that could be seen from on top of the bridge.
