Big Vermillion Bridge Bridge

I stopped by here the other day and looks like they might have did a road alignment sometime. the bridge in the pictures looks to be located several hundred feet south of the bridge now used today. the paved and gaurdrails are still standing on it on the east end and is very overgrown with trees, the westend has been leveled and now has houses built there.

next time will have my camera to take some pics

These are photos taken by Art Kistler for IDOT in 1924 and 1959.

The structure was over the Vermilion River an the route now designated Illinois 71, just east of Jonesville, La Salle County, Illinois. It was replaced about 1960 and again about 2004. The Vermilion River enters the Illinois River just a short distance north of this bridge--the Vermilion flows north. It crossed the CB&Q RR and a spur track at the west end. The spur served the shipping dock for the Marquette Cement Co (now Lonestar) and remnants of the dock are still visible. The CB&Q crossed the Illinois River further north and that lift bridge (formerly a swing span) was removed in 1980. The west embankment for the newest bridge is built across the abandoned RR ROW. A later article in the local newspaper stated the bridge this one replaced was dismantled and re-assembled across the Vermilion River upstream near Oglesby.