UP - Republican River Bridge
Photos
Union Pacific Railroad Bridge across Republican River at Junction City, KS
View from the northwest
Photo taken by Phil h
View this photo at panoramio.com
BH Photo #256689
Facts
- Overview
- Two span Lattice through truss bridge over Republican River on Union Pacific Railroad in Junction City and Fort Riley
- Location
- Junction City, Geary County, Kansas
- Status
- Open to traffic
- History
- Built Ca. 1899
- Builder
- - Lassig Bridge & Iron Works of Chicago, Illinois
- Railroad
- - Union Pacific Railroad (UP)
- Design
- Two span riveted Latticethrough truss.
- Dimensions
-
Length of largest span: 140.0 ft.
Total length: 280.0 ft.
- Approximate latitude, longitude
- +39.06049, -96.80240 (decimal degrees)
39°03'38" N, 96°48'09" W (degrees°minutes'seconds") - Approximate UTM coordinates
- 14/690141/4325788 (zone/easting/northing)
- Quadrangle map:
- Junction City
- Inventory number
- BH 38171 (Bridgehunter.com ID)
Update Log
- March 10, 2017: New photos from John Marvig
- June 18, 2013: Photo imported by Dave King
- March 8, 2010: Updated by Robert Elder: Added Street View link
- November 11, 2009: Updated by Robert Elder: Updated Overview, Design, and Design Description.
- November 22, 2008: Added by Robert Elder
Sources
- Robert Elder - robertelder1 [at] gmail [dot] com
- Dave King - DKinghawkfan [at] hotmail [dot] com
- John Marvig - marvigj27 [at] gmail [dot] com
Comments
It could be possible that it was a standard design for the railroad, and the portals were used regardless of bridge design? I understand why you would believe it was for a pinned connection. I could see where it was a standard design...
Replacing the portal bracing for height clearance makes sense. I was just always under the impression that portal bracing gaps were designed to accommodate a pin.
Robert,
The trusses along this line originally had the portal bracing similar to the Cloud County structure. I'm guessing it was replaced to increase the size capacity of trains on this line.
Well, never mind. This bridge has a portal bracing gap as well:
The portal bracing on this bridge is not flush with the top of the endpost. Instead, it curves inward leaving a gap between the portal bracing and the endpost. Often this is done to accommodate a pin. You can see this system very well here:
http://bridgehunter.com/ks/butler/bh48844/
Yet, on this railroad bridge is riveted, not pin-connected. Thus, there is no pin that needs to be accommodated by a gap. Could parts of the portal bracing on this bridge have been recycled from a pin-connected bridge?
I personally have never seen a portal bracing gap on a riveted bridge. Has anybody else seen this? Some of you have looked at far more bridges than I have.
This page's URL is http://bridgehunter.com/ks/geary/bh38171/
That makes sense. Perhaps this design was in fact originally designed to accommodate a pin, but then perhaps it became a standardized design and remained in use even after the railroad transitioned to using rivet connections. Plus, if by chance the railroad or fabricators had some left over portal bracing components leftover why not use them?