Euritt Bridge
Photos
Large Span 3/4 View From West
Photo by Joe Elliott, Summer 1995, for HAER
View photos at Library of Congress
BH Photo #122497
Facts
- Overview
- Pratt through truss bridge over Grand River on River Road near Leon
- Location
- Decatur County, Iowa
- Status
- Intact but appears to be closed to traffic according to Bing
- History
- Built 1882 by Phoenix Iron Co. erected by Daniel and Webster; Current status unknown
- Builders
- - Daniel & Webster of Garden Grove, Iowa (Contractor)
- Phoenix Iron Co. of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (Iron/Steel Manufacturer)
- Design
- Pin connected Pratt through truss and a Pratt pony truss with one inclined end post on one end and one upright end post on the other. This unique pony truss is the only known truss/truss leg hybrid in Iowa and very rare elsewhere.
"The Euritt Bridge is configured with a Pratt through truss main stpan and the pony truss/truss leg approach span. In Iowa, pony truss approcah spans were often added to a main span in order to reduce the length of the spans and the cost of the bridge. The main span is a 126' seven-panel wroght iron Pratt through truss with a 13' roadway. It is 18' high, with the upper chord and inclined end posts built up of two channels with cover plate and lacing. The lower chord is two forged rectangular eyebars. The verticals are two channels with lacing and the diagonals and counter braces are paired, iron-rod eyebars in the middle three panels and paired, forged eyebars in the end panels.
"The 60' four-panel pony truss consists of similar members, but with upright endposts at the approcah end and inclined end posts where the trusses meet...A 30' wood stringer approach on the west and another 16' approach on the wast complete the bridge."
--Leslie Pinter, 1995
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 Departent of Transportation (IDOT). Preliinary research was performmed by Clayton B. Fraser of Fraserdesign, Loveland Colorado.
` - Dimensions
-
Length of largest span: 126.0 ft.
Total length: 234.9 ft.
Deck width: 13.1 ft.
- Approximate latitude, longitude
- +40.72178, -93.87608 (decimal degrees)
40°43'18" N, 93°52'34" W (degrees°minutes'seconds") - Approximate UTM coordinates
- 15/426010/4508242 (zone/easting/northing)
- Quadrangle map:
- Lamoni North
- Average daily traffic (as of 2012)
- 20
- Inventory numbers
- IA 137270 (Iowa bridge number)
BH 37317 (Bridgehunter.com ID) - Inspection report (as of November 2015)
- View more at BridgeReports.com
Update Log
- March 31, 2015: Updated by Dave King: Added categories "Lally columns", "Wooden deck"
- February 20, 2012: Updated by Jason Smith: Updated the information on the bridge
- August 26, 2008: Added by J.R. Manning
Sources
- J.R. Manning - thekitchenguy [at] sbcglobal [dot] net
- HAER IA-49 - Euritt Bridge
- IA GenWeb - Decatur County - Postcard
- Jason Smith - flensburg [dot] bridgehunter [dot] av [at] googlemail [dot] com
This page's URL is http://bridgehunter.com/ia/decatur/euritt/
Field visit notes: This bridge is long-closed to traffic. The west approach would be easy to do the road is in good shape. I was afraid to try it however because of the "Passing the last house on a dead-end road" Theorem which states that such road shall trigger landowner response who shall either attempt to shoot you or tell you their entire life story. If you wish to try the east approach its much more rugged and you must traverse a thin sliver of gravel pit property. It is possible however. Note that the public road on this side is not the North/South road shown on maps near the river, that's gravel pit stuff. Its the one further east, which north of the bridge goes NE and meets IA-2 at an angle closer to I-35.