RJCM - Cumberland River Swing Bridge
Facts
- Overview
- Swing through truss bridge over Cumberland River on R.J. Corman Railroad/Memphis Line at Clarksville
- Location
- Clarksville, Montgomery County, Tennessee
- Status
- Open to traffic
- History
- Built 1891 by the Pencoyd Bridge & Construction Co.
- Builder
- - Pencoyd Bridge & Construction Co. of Pencoyd, Pennsylvania
- Railroads
- - Louisville & Nashville Railroad (LN)
- Nashville, Chattanooga & St. Louis Railway
- R.J. Corman Railroad (RJCN; RJCR; RJCC; RJCL; RJCM; RJCP; RJCK; RJNX; RJCV)
- Design
- Main span: Swing pin-connected through truss
Approaches: Pair of pin-connected, 8-panel Camelback through trusses - Also called
- NKP - Cumberland River Swing Bridge
R J Corman - Cumberland River Swing Bridge
L&N - Cumberland River Swing Bridge - Approximate latitude, longitude
- +36.52244, -87.36480 (decimal degrees)
36°31'21" N, 87°21'53" W (degrees°minutes'seconds") - Approximate UTM coordinates
- 16/467339/4041958 (zone/easting/northing)
- Quadrangle map:
- Clarksville
- Inventory number
- BH 43622 (Bridgehunter.com ID)
Update Log
- October 5, 2020: New photos from Jon Fleenor
- August 20, 2018: New photos from Jack Schmidt
- December 10, 2015: New Street View added by Douglas Butler
- March 1, 2014: New photos from Jack Schmidt
- January 10, 2011: New Street View added by Eddie Douthitt
- January 2, 2010: Updated by Calvin Sneed: http://www.csx.com/
- November 14, 2009: Added by J.P.
Sources
- J.P. - wildcatjon2000 [at] gmail [dot] com
- Calvin Sneed - us43137415 [at] yahoo [dot] com
- Eddie Douthitt - dalton1861 [at] yahoo [dot] com
- Douglas Butler
- Jack Schmidt - jjturtle [at] earthlink [dot] net
- Jon Fleenor
Comments
How often is the bridge house manned?
Hi Brittany:
My suspicion is that the numbers indicate the clearance underneath the bridge. More specifically, they likely indicate the distance between the water and the bottom of the trusses.
Why do the water gauge numbers go from top to bottom instead of bottom to top? I assumed if the 0 was at the bottom it would show how high the water is.
how much railroad traffic travels over the bridge?
This bridge was built by the Nashville, Chattanooga, and St. Louis Railway; not the Nickel Plate.
I live in town and I have seen this bridge many times. Once a barge hit it, causing one of the pillars to become encased in concrete and preserved. It is a beautiful bridge and is one of the lucky few that survived the flood of 2010. This is one tough bridge. Oh, and you're right, those approaches are insane! They are so freakin long it's weird but true!
Thanks for showing this bridge. The stone piers were built in 1859-1860 for the original wooden swing bridge built to cross the Cumberland River for the Memphis, Clarksville & Louisville RR. The steel bridge was built in the early 20th Century I believe.
A few years ago a barge did a hit and run on one of the original piers and it was rebuilt - you show it in your picture.
J.P., if you want to see a wooden trestle that'll knock your socks off, see the Centerville Railroad Bridge in Hickman County.
That one is almost as long, as it is tall!
thanks for the correction on that.
Do you mean the CUMBERLAND River? (I've made the same error myself...)
This page's URL is http://bridgehunter.com/tn/montgomery/bh43622/
Is there a meaning behind the different colors and times they are displayed?