Bridgehunter.com | Tensaw Spanish River Bridge

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Photos

Aerial View Of Tensaw River Bridge In Local Context, Facing East, Photograph Taken From Roof Of First Bank Of Mobile Building

Photo taken by Daniel R. Pratt for the Historic American Engineering Record

View photos at Library of Congress

Map

Description

The Tensaw River Lift Bridge is one of the oldest remaining lift bridges in Alabama. It is important in local history as an integral component of the "Cochrane Bridge", a 10.5 mile-long causeway connecting Mobile and Baldwin counties over Mobile Bay. The construction of the causeway helped complete the "Spanish Trail", a transcontinental highway designed to increase tourism and commerce on the Gulf of Mexico coast and westward. It is the work of Harrington, Howard & Ash Consulting Engineers of Kansas City, Missouri, one of the most important early 20th century bridge designers in the United States. The bridge is not currently listed on the National Register of Historic Places

-- Historic American Engineering Record

Facts

Overview: Lost Parker through truss bridge over Tensaw Spanish River on US Hwy. 90 *
Location: Mobile, Mobile County, Alabama
Status: Replaced by a new bridge
History: Built 1927, demolished and replaced in 1995
Design: Parker through truss (5 spans) with stringer approaches
Dimensions: Length of largest span: 202.1 ft.
Total length: 1,402.0 ft.
Deck width: 19.7 ft.
Approximate latitude, longitude: +30.68333, -88.01000 (decimal degrees)
30°40'60" N, 88°00'36" W (degrees°minutes'seconds")
Approximate UTM coordinates: 16/403259/3394943 (zone/easting/northing)
USGS topographic map: Mobile
Inventory number: BH 52696 (Bridgehunter.com ID)
Inspection (as of 09/1991): Deck condition rating: Poor (4 out of 9)
Superstructure condition rating: Poor (4 out of 9)
Substructure condition rating: Fair (5 out of 9)
Appraisal: Structurally deficient
Sufficiency rating: 28.3 (out of 100)
Average daily traffic (as of 1990): 5,945

Update Log

June 22, 2012: Added by Jason Smith

Sources

Jason Smith - JDSmith77 [at] gmx [dot] net
HAER AL-104 - Tensaw River Lift Bridge, Spanning Tensaw River at U.S. Highway 90, Mobile, Mobile County, AL

Comments

Tensaw Spanish River Bridge

Posted March 14, 2013, by Anonymous (hemeloser [at] yahoo [dot] com)

The route of the causeway is the same now as it was when contructed. It involves four separate open space water crossings, two of which are on either side of Blakeley Island.

The photo here is the bridge over the westernmost outlet of the Tensaw which merges with the Spanish River from the Mobile River. All of the spans are fixed.

To my knowledge, the only crossing with a lift span was over the Mobile River proper.

The spans over the easternmost two outlets of the Tensaw near

Spanish Fort are not shown, suggesting that they were not Parker through truss.

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