The Stone Arch Bridge at Minneapolis, Minnesota
The Stone Arch Bridge was built by the great James J. Hill to
provide access to a new union railroad station located in downtown Minneapolis. Constructed
from February 1881 to November 1883 the bridge was 2,100 feet long and
required 100,000 tons of stone and 49,000 cubic yards of masonry. In 1962 the
U.S. Corps of Engineers removed a portion of the bridge to allow an entrance
to a lock for barge traffic. The aesthetic damage to the bridge can be seen in
some of the pictures below. In 1965 a major flood on the Mississippi damaged
a section of the bridge causing it to settle. This damage
was repaired and the bridge continued to carry Great Northern (now Burlington
Northern Sante Fe) trains until 1982. It now is used as a pedestrian and
bicycle trail.
These photos of the Stone Arch bridge are courtesy of Steve Smith of
the University of Minnesota.
