Overview: Cable Stayed Steel Arch
The design of this bridge is unique. The bridge is actually suspended from the arch using cable stay technology.
Photo taken by James McCray in Feb 09
BH Photo #134672
I-94 has a cool looking cable arch that the roadway passes thru near Detroit at Taylor Mi.
In my opinion "recycled" is a bit mild to describe what Columbus did to their historic truss bridge. They annihilated a historic bridge that was PRESERVED as an exhibit. Talk about wasteful. I don't care for cities that dispose of their heritage at the expense of modern architecture. Why can't we have both modern architecture and historic architecture side by side? To me, downtown Chicago has always symbolized this quite well, as does the United Kingdom. The historic truss bridge would have offered an interesting contrast to modern bridges such as these, to anyone taking an architectural tour in Columbus. Now, they only get to see one side of the coin.
This and the nearby Cable-stayed bridge fit into Columbus' architecture theme.
For those of you who aren't familiar.... Columbus, Indiana is a small city of about 40,000 that features the architecture of many major cities. In fact, an article I read a few years back had Columbus ranked 6th in the U.S. for the number of structures designed by noted architects....behind the likes of New York and Chicago. For many years now, whenever a new structure is needed a special process is used to choose the designer from a pool of candidates.
So the I-65 Bridge was really built as a sort of "Welcome Sign" to the city. And although I'm not a big cable-stayed enthusiast, the 2nd St. Bridge is really quite a site when seen at night. Their web-site features a "Bridges of Bartholomew County" page with these two spans and the covered bridge at Mill Race Park (A transplant from Union County via Indianapolis), but sadly says nothing about the county's nice collection of metal truss bridges....most of which have been restored. And a major gaffe occurred last year when a small Pratt through truss was "recycled". The little 5-panel span had stood proudly in Mill Race Park like a piece of sculpture for all to see. When the city decided a new building should go in it's place they inexplicably sent the century-old landmark to the scrap heap. That no communication was made to Indiana Landmarks or any other agencies was truly disappointing.
Columbus really is a unique place.....that just needs to do a little better job with it's "Historic Architecture"
What a nice way to add some appearance to a modern interstate bridge. I remember seeing it when I would visit my father.
Yes, the I-94 Telegraph Road Bridge is another modern aesthetic arch bridge on a freeway. It was built just before Detroit hosted the Superbowl, and the bridge's portal bracing is football-shaped which is probably not a coincidence. http://www.panoramio.com/photo/14566484
Another "football bridge" but much more pathetic than the Indiana or Michigan bridges, is this bridge near Pro Football Hall of Fame: http://www.panoramio.com/photo/4872144 The reason its pathetic is the arch is not structural, and serves no function, unlike the Indiana and Michigan bridges.