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Kate Shelley High Bridge

Boone County, Iowa
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Photos 

Photo taken by Joe Elliott, Summer, 1995

View photos at Library of Congress

Map 

Facts 

Overview
Deck truss bridge over Des Moines River on Union Pacific Railroad west of Boone
Location
Boone County, Iowa
Status
Closed to traffic
History
Built 1899-1901, bypassed in 2007-09
Builders
- American Bridge Co. of New York
- George S. Morison of New Bedford, Massachusetts (Engineer)
Design
"The Boone Viaduct has an approximately 300' long, 60' deep deck channel span composed of two deck Pratt trusses with the panels divided into five sub-divided panels by means of sub-verticals which support the middles of the top-chord sections.

"There are four lines of plate girders, two under each track, of a uniform depth of 7'. Beginning on the east end there are two 75' plate-girder spans on a rocker bent; then six 45' plate girder spans, alternating with six 75' plate-girder spans. The 45' plate-girder spans carried on and form the tops of towers consisting of four columns each, rigidly braced together on all sides. The 75' plate-girders span the opening between consecutive towers.

"This bridge is one of the last projects of noted bridge engineer George Morison, who died two years after the structure was built. The bridge was the longest and heaviest viaduct of its time, and may be the longest extant double-track railroad viaduct in the world. It is listed in the National Register of Historic Places.

"This document was prepared as part of the Iowa Historic Bridges Recording Project performed during the Summer of 1995 by the Historic American Engineering Record (HAER). The project was sponsored by the Iowa Department of Transportation. (IDOT)."

Report of the Historic American Engineering Record
`

Dimensions
Length of largest span: 300.0 ft.
Total length: 2,685.0 ft. (0.5 mi.)
Recognition
Posted to the National Register of Historic Places on November 17, 1978
Also called
Boone High Bridge
Approximate latitude, longitude
+42.05936, -93.97023   (decimal degrees)
42°03'34" N, 93°58'13" W   (degrees°minutes'seconds")
Approximate UTM coordinates
15/419722/4656821 (zone/easting/northing)
USGS topographic map
Boone West
Inventory numbers
NRHP 78001207 (National Register of Historic Places reference number)
BH 37240 (Bridgehunter.com ID)

Categories 

10-panel truss (116)
American Bridge Co. (449)
Boone County, Iowa (56)
Built 1901 (284)
Built during 1900s (4,246)
Chicago & North Western Railway (470)
Closed (2,071)
Deck truss (953)
Des Moines River (159)
George S. Morison (18)
Iowa (3,501)
 NR-listed (2,353)
Owned by railroad (4,039)
Pratt deck truss (169)
Pratt truss (5,658)
Railroad (4,070)
Span length 250-500 feet (863)
Tall Bridges (71)
Total length over 2500 feet (587)
Truss (23,566)
Union Pacific Railroad (793)

Update Log 

  • March 28, 2013: New photos from Steve Conro
  • March 28, 2013: New photos from John Marvig
  • September 21, 2012: New photos from Jann Mayer
  • July 26, 2012: New photos from John Marvig
  • November 18, 2010: New photos from Jason Smith
  • September 28, 2010: New photo from Jacob P. Bernard
  • November 22, 2009: Updated by J.R. Manning: Updated Railroad Data and Status
  • August 28, 2009: Updated by Nathan Morton: Bridge has been replaced and as of August 2009 all train trafffic is utilizing the new parallel structure
  • August 23, 2009: New photos from Nathan Morton
  • July 9, 2009: New photo from J.R. Manning
  • August 20, 2008: New photo from J.R. Manning
  • August 19, 2008: Added by J.R. Manning

Sources 

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Comments 

Kate Shelly High Bridge
Posted August 28, 2009, by J.R. Manning (thekitchenguy [at] sbcglobal [dot] net)

Nathan and Andy, next time you go visit the Kate Shelley Bridge, please take a drive down to the Des Moines River Wagon Bridge, a couple hundred yards downstream, and get some photos of the repaired structure. Thanks!

http://bridgehunter.com/ia/boone/77850/

By the way, there is a well-written article from the June 2007 issue of the HDR, Inc. internal magazine. It talks about the old bridge, the new bridge, and the story of how Kate Shelley saved an express train in 1881, earning the grateful respect of the passengers on the express, praise from across the country and local residents, not to mention the Chicago & Northwestern. (Kate Shelley even took a job as a station master with the railroad, a position she held until her death in 1912.)

You can read it here: http://hdrinc.com/Assets/documents/Publications/RailLine/june2007/KateShelley.pdf

Here's a photo of Kate Shelley:

Uploaded file: GIF image data, version 89a, 140 x 184, 8598 bytes

Kate Shelly High Bridge
Posted March 1, 2009, by Andy Winegar (jitterz [at] hotmail [dot] com)

I went out today to see if I could see the new bridge in use, and what became of the old one. However, the new one is not yet finished. All the towers are done, but about 20% of the steel needs to be erected on the east end. So for now the old bridge is still in use.