220th Street Overpass
Description
Built out of one span of the second bridge at Carver, Minnesota; moved here by the railroad and reconstructed/erected by Minneapolis Steel Construction Company (Minneapolis Steel & Machinery Company).Facts
- Overview
- Double Intersection Warren Pony truss bridge over Union Pacific Railroad on CR P33 (220th Street)
- Location
- Webster County, Iowa
- Status
- Open to traffic
- History
- Built 1889 as a railroad bridge at Carver, Minnesota; Moved here 1921
- Builder
- - Minneapolis Steel & Machinery Co. of Minneapolis, Minnesota
- Railroad
- - Minneapolis & St. Louis Railway (MSTL)
- Design
- Double-intersection Warren pony truss
- Dimensions
-
Length of largest span: 74.0 ft.
Total length: 78.1 ft.
Deck width: 21.0 ft.
- Approximate latitude, longitude
- +42.47221, -94.29273 (decimal degrees)
42°28'20" N, 94°17'34" W (degrees°minutes'seconds") - Approximate UTM coordinates
- 15/393733/4703017 (zone/easting/northing)
- Quadrangle map:
- Moorland
- Land survey
- T. 88 N., R. 30 W., Sec. 1
- Average daily traffic (as of 2007)
- 90
- Inventory numbers
- IA 342800 (Iowa bridge number)
BH 14708 (Bridgehunter.com ID) - Inspection report (as of November 2009)
- Overall condition: Fair
Superstructure condition rating: Fair (5 out of 9)
Substructure condition rating: Fair (5 out of 9)
Deck condition rating: Fair (5 out of 9)
Sufficiency rating: 53 (out of 100)
View more at BridgeReports.com
Update Log
- December 2, 2020: Updated by John Marvig: added relocation history
- March 27, 2019: New photos from John Marvig
Related Bridges
- Second Carver Railroad Bridge (Parts reused from)
Sources
- Historicbridges.org - by Nathan Holth
- John Marvig - marvigj27 [at] gmail [dot] com
Comments
My favorite stock photo fail...
A couple years ago, I saw a (probably phishing spam) link about some sort of Alaskan vacation package. The photo of "Alaska" depicted the night sky - with the Southern Cross front and center...
Not to mention that the “most beautiful bridges in your state” always seem to be half MOBs...implying that this particular bridge is unsafe seems kinda dumb though. There’s really no evidence that I saw or the NBI has seen that this bridge is in super poor condition..
"Only In Your State" is an absolute joke to say the least. I used to get the ones for Indiana but found them to be littered with incorrect information. I would comment and try to help correct things (especially relating to bridges), but found they would reprint the same story at a later time with the same fallacies.
Oooooh, dat's scary!
https://www.onlyinyourstate.com/iowa/ia-haunted-bridge-1800s...
Lol. Not one of their stock photos is of this bridge or of a pony, and probably not from iowa, either.
I have found the contract and blueprints for this bridge in a collection of Authority for Expenditures (AFEs) by the Minneapolis & St. Louis Railroad. The bridge was originally built in 1889 as an approach span to the railroad bridge at Carver, Minnesota. Upon the replacement of that bridge, the two truss lines were cut from the floor and stored at the station in Carver between 1917 and 1921, before being shipped to this location that summer. Minneapolis Steel Construction Company (Minneapolis Steel & Machinery Company) constructed a new floor system and erected this bridge at its present location. The other approach span at Carver had a similar fate, ending up as an overpass in Victoria, Minnesota; although that bridge was replaced in 2003.
Looking at Nathan's documentation of this bridge, it appears that this is another example of a railroad bridge reused for a road. There were at least two more examples in the Twin Cities of this along Minneapolis & St. Louis tracks, both which were confirmed to be railroad spans with valuation material. Unfortunately, this is the last survivor of M&StL pony truss overpasses.
On a side note, it is unknown where these came from. There is no record of the railroad ever using these for railroad use anywhere on the system. As a smaller railroad, is it possible they bought the secondhand spans from another railroad?
This page's URL is http://bridgehunter.com/ia/webster/342800/
Or the "Greetings from Indiana" postcard... With a covered bridge from New Hampshire adorning it!
...Like we don't have any in the Hoosier state!