C&EI - Collison Trestle
Facts
- Overview
- Abandoned Deck truss bridge over Middle Fork Vermilion River on former Chicago and Eastern Illinois Railroad northwest of Collison
- Location
- Vermilion County, Illinois
- Status
- Abandoned
- History
- Built ca. 1894, abandoned ca. 1990s?
- Builder
- - McArthur Bros of New York City, New York (Substructure)
- Railroad
- - Chicago & Eastern Illinois Railroad (CEI)
- Design
- Main span: Warren deck truss
Approaches: Deck plate girder - Dimensions
-
Length of largest span: 125.0 ft.
Total length: 310.0 ft.
- Also called
- Collison Trestle
- Approximate latitude, longitude
- +40.24477, -87.77770 (decimal degrees)
40°14'41" N, 87°46'40" W (degrees°minutes'seconds") - Approximate UTM coordinates
- 16/433852/4455214 (zone/easting/northing)
- Quadrangle map:
- Collison
- Inventory number
- BH 47957 (Bridgehunter.com ID)
Update Log
- December 29, 2022: Updated by John Marvig: Added substructure builder
- November 23, 2022: New photos from John Marvig
- November 16, 2022: New photos from John Marvig
- November 2, 2016: Updated by Christopher Finigan: Added category "Pin-connected"
- November 8, 2013: Updated by Luke Harden: Added category "Chicago & Eastern Illinois Railroad"
- January 4, 2013: New photos from Jacob P. Bernard
- February 3, 2011: Added by Jacob P. Bernard
Sources
- Jacob P. Bernard
- John Marvig - marvigj27 [at] gmail [dot] com
Comments
This is not a former Conrail or NYC bridge but was a former C&EI bridge after looking at the location. The bypass from Rossville Jct. ran south to the mines around Westville and Georgetown IL linking up the former Grape Creek branch to Villa Grove outside west of Indianola if I remember right on the route. This bridge was also used by the EJ&E which had trackage rights on the C&EI to reach the mines in this area to bypass Danville which especially at that time heavily congested with rail traffic around Danville Jct. The Danville Jct Society of the NHRS out of Danville with a museum in Rossville has more information on this line. It was cutback to Collison then Henning. At onetime the line was used to haul coal to the IP powerplant west of Danville.
Grayson
This page's URL is http://bridgehunter.com/il/vermilion/collison-railroad/
I finally visited this bridge on 11/13/2022. The bridge is on and surrounded by DNR land. It was easy to access from a parking lot at 870 Road and the old railroad grade. The bottom of the bridge would be easy to access from a DNR parking lot to the southwest.
Unfortunately the east pier is beginning to fail and there is no clear future for this bridge.