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Great Crossings Bridge (Old US 40/National Road)

Somerset County, Pennsylvania
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Street View 

Description 

This bridge's status says "Open to Pedestrians" due to the fact that it has never been closed to anyone, and since it is in perfect shape, curious pedestrians walk across it when the lake level is down.

Facts 

Overview
Stone arch bridge over Youghiogheny River Lake (or, to state it more accurately, the Youghiogheny River Lake crosses the Great Crossings Bridge) on an old alignment of US 40/National Road
Location
Somerfield (City submerged beneath Youghiogheny River Lake since 1943), Somerset County, Pennsylvania
Status
Open to pedestrians
Future prospects
The bridge is "Preserved in place" by default.
History
Built 1818 as part of the National Road. Bridge submerged along with Somerfield when Youghiogheny River was dammed downstream to create Youghiogheny River Lake.
Design
Stone arch
Approximate latitude, longitude
+39.75465, -79.39553   (decimal degrees)
39°45'17" N, 79°23'44" W   (degrees°minutes'seconds")
Approximate UTM coordinates
17/637449/4401757 (zone/easting/northing)
USGS topographic map
Ohiopyle
Inventory number
BH 50552 (Bridgehunter.com ID)

Categories 

19th Century (3,816)
Arch (9,415)
Built 1818 (2)
Built during 1810s (15)
Deck arch (8,692)
Have street view (9,880)
National Road (15)
 Open to Pedestrians (2,084)
Pennsylvania (3,037)
Preserved (652)
Somerfield (City submerged beneath Youghiogheny River Lake since 1943), Pennsylvania (1)
Somerset County, Pennsylvania (70)
Stone arch (1,925)
US 40 (106)

Update Log 

  • December 15, 2011: Updated by James McCray: Added categories "US 40", "National Road"

Sources 

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Comments 

Great Crossings Bridge (Old US 40/National Road)
Posted December 15, 2011, by Tony Dillon (spansaver [at] hotmail [dot] com)

I have to agree with Nathan...and would classify this one as an "Interesting Ruin".

Great Crossings Bridge (Old US 40/National Road)
Posted December 15, 2011, by Nathan Holth (form3 [at] historicbridges [dot] org)

PennDOT already found the US-40 truss bridge seen in the background of the Panoramio photos from 2000. The bridge there today is a PennDOT special. (Ugly modern bridge with stone formliner on all concrete elements)

As for the stone bridge, I would argue that the bridge falls a bit short of preserved and perfect shape. In the photos from 2000, I see evidence of severe deterioration. Entire portions of the parapet are missing, and on some portions of the bridge the belt course and even parts of the spandrel wall are missing as well. The loss of the stones in the spandrel wall appear to have exposed the earth fill to the water in which the bridge is submerged, which have caused it to slowly wash the fill out of the bridge. This can be seen in a 2010 photo of the bridge where portions of the added concrete deck have broken and settled, since the fill that once supported them is gone.

Great Crossings Bridge (Old US 40/National Road)
Posted December 15, 2011, by James McCray (jamesinslocomb [at] yahoo [dot] com)

Check this one out! Who needs Atlantis? We have the entire city of Somerfield, PA and its bridge submerged and preserved perfectly underneath the Youghiogheny River Lake. However the bridge appears above water from time to time. Well, at least this bridge is safe from the clutches of PennDOT, then again, maybe not; for this one they may hire rogue ex-NAVY Seals and have them plant underwater explosives on the bridge to destroy it.