I found the link to the full NTSB report on Bayou Canot.
http://ntl1.specialcollection.net/scripts/ws.dll?websearch&site=dot_railroads
Go there and click on the year 1993. It is the first rpeort, noted as Amtrak.
Also a good source for older accident reports
BucyrusIIRC, there is a Mississippi River bridge whose location escapes me (Vicksburg?)-a cantilever, I believe-that has/had one pier out of alignment almost from the day of opening. Apparantly it's not too noticeable...but just knowing that would always give me pause before crossing (but I get nervous when it comes to heights, anyway...)
Yes that is a KCS RR bridge at Vicksburg, Ms. When I was in college drove over the bridge which was a narrow 2 lane toll road with the IC track on the south side. Naturally was on the bridge at night with a 4 unit diesel train crossing along side of me. The bridge shook so much I finally almost stopped until train vacated bridge at about a 10 MPH speed. Bridge closed to automobiles the day I-20 bridge over Mississippi river opened.
A few years ago the western bridge support column was found displaced and KCS shut down the route until repairs made. Think it was caused by scouring of foundation but not sure? This bridge IMHO probably is the one choke point that could shut down the "speedway" at any time. Could happen this spring when the Mississipppi River will be high from all the winter snow melt runoff.
One of the most important bridge failure is one that did not occurr on the Oakland Bay bridge. 1989 world series earthquake failed a section but it fortunately fell on the lower deck. That got California DOT to plan a replacement. The first stage was replacing of a segment that shut the bridge over labor day. An in depth replacement inspection found potential eyebolt cracks which extended the shutdown. More inspections later found other eyebolt cracks that again shut the bridge to traffic. These are DOT engineers that are really doing their job.
However any large earthquake that has an earth shift would bring the present bridge down. A report today states that parts of Chile moved 10 ft to the west. Old bridges designed for that ? No. Newer bridges? maybe. Suspect suspension bridges might do better? PDN any comments?
Paul_D_North_JrThere's a little table of 11 bridge failures over the 150 years from 1857 to 2007; the Ashtabula Ohio bridge in 1876 is the 2nd entry, and the I-35W bridge in Minneapolis in 2007 is the last. Notably, 6 of the 11 are railroad bridges; but the last one before the 1993 Big Bayou Canot Amtrak wreck was the 2nd attempt to bridge the St. Lawrence River at Quebec in 1916 - the other 5 in the last 40 years since 1967 are all highway bridges. This excerpt is also illuminating [emphasis added - PDN]:
There's a little table of 11 bridge failures over the 150 years from 1857 to 2007; the Ashtabula Ohio bridge in 1876 is the 2nd entry, and the I-35W bridge in Minneapolis in 2007 is the last. Notably, 6 of the 11 are railroad bridges; but the last one before the 1993 Big Bayou Canot Amtrak wreck was the 2nd attempt to bridge the St. Lawrence River at Quebec in 1916 - the other 5 in the last 40 years since 1967 are all highway bridges. This excerpt is also illuminating [emphasis added - PDN]:
Nothing about the Custer Creek bridge washout on the Milwaukee? This happened in 1938 a few miles northeast of Miles City. MT. OTOH, a washout is a bit of a different prblem than a straight bridge failure.
- Erik
Not a railroad bridge, but one of history’s more catastrophic bridge failures nevertheless. Here, the Minneapolis I35W Bridge poses innocently in the sun, making no mention of its imminent plan to become famous on August 1, 2007.
http://www.johnweeks.com/bridges/pages/ms16.html
Bucyrus blownout cylinder Bucyrus On that same line, there is a much larger, multiple span deck girder bridge on stone piers spanning the Minnesota River at Carver, MN. In earlier times, the M&StL routinely had commercial divers enter the river and inspect the bedding of the stone piers. Over the last 20 years or so, one of those stone piers has settled unevenly, apparently due to the river scouring out the bedding for the pier. Before operations ended, that pier was tipped toward downstream so that its top was about 12”-18” out of alignment. It was very visible as a large dip and offset in the bridge deck, and in just looking at the pier compared to the rest of the piers. I found it hard to believe that U.P. continued to use the bridge when the pier bedding was so obviously compromised. How could you be sure of the pier performance at any given train event when the condition of the pier was obviously changing over time? How many degrees can you tip a GP-38 before you concentrate so much extra loading on the tipped pier that it tips further? What I'd like to know is how often trains were put through in a day and how fast they would run. I know there would have been restrictions but---- Also what would that offset do to the piers next to the tipped pier----I'd love to have seen what kinds of side loading would have occured with, say, 15 cars loaded---- Here is a link showing the bridge at Carver, MN over the Minnesota River: http://www.johnweeks.com/bridges/pages/rm01.html In the first photo, you can see the misalignment toward the far end. In the bottom photo, you can see the defective pier, which is third from the left. In this photo, the river flows toward the camera, and you can see the pier tipped toward the camera as well. My impression is that the misalignment progressed significantly further than shown here. During the final operations over the defect, trains were minimal in size, speed, and frequency. They would consist of one engine (GP-38) and 1-6 cars. Speed was very restricted over the bridge, to perhaps 10mph or less. The defect appears to involve only one of the piers. There is no indication of a structural problem with the integrity of the stone pier itself. Instead, it appears to be a case of the whole pier being tipped 5-10 degrees due to a loss of footing in the riverbed. Trees float down the river and lodge against the bridge piers. Over the last 20 years of operation, the U.P. and previous owner C&NW allowed the trees to accumulate into a huge floating mass covering maybe an acre or more. Then the company would stage a rail crane and grapple on the bridge to pick the trees out of the mass, and place them on the downstream side of the bridge. When these tree massing events reached their maximum, they apparently restricted the river to a narrower flow, which accelerated the bottom scouring around the affected pier. I know that yard tracks can become shockingly misaligned and still pass trains without derailment. But I found it rather surprising that the company would accept running trains over this bridge defect when is was obviously in the process (although a slow process) of developing abrupt, catastrophic failure. Moreover, the consequences of reaching that failure point while riding over it in an engine would be quite dreadful for the crew. Ironically, though, the eventuality of a pending catastrophic failure of this bridge was precluded by the abrupt, catastrophic failure of a small trestle only about mile south, which ended operation over this line.
blownout cylinder Bucyrus On that same line, there is a much larger, multiple span deck girder bridge on stone piers spanning the Minnesota River at Carver, MN. In earlier times, the M&StL routinely had commercial divers enter the river and inspect the bedding of the stone piers. Over the last 20 years or so, one of those stone piers has settled unevenly, apparently due to the river scouring out the bedding for the pier. Before operations ended, that pier was tipped toward downstream so that its top was about 12”-18” out of alignment. It was very visible as a large dip and offset in the bridge deck, and in just looking at the pier compared to the rest of the piers. I found it hard to believe that U.P. continued to use the bridge when the pier bedding was so obviously compromised. How could you be sure of the pier performance at any given train event when the condition of the pier was obviously changing over time? How many degrees can you tip a GP-38 before you concentrate so much extra loading on the tipped pier that it tips further? What I'd like to know is how often trains were put through in a day and how fast they would run. I know there would have been restrictions but---- Also what would that offset do to the piers next to the tipped pier----I'd love to have seen what kinds of side loading would have occured with, say, 15 cars loaded----
Bucyrus On that same line, there is a much larger, multiple span deck girder bridge on stone piers spanning the Minnesota River at Carver, MN. In earlier times, the M&StL routinely had commercial divers enter the river and inspect the bedding of the stone piers. Over the last 20 years or so, one of those stone piers has settled unevenly, apparently due to the river scouring out the bedding for the pier. Before operations ended, that pier was tipped toward downstream so that its top was about 12”-18” out of alignment. It was very visible as a large dip and offset in the bridge deck, and in just looking at the pier compared to the rest of the piers. I found it hard to believe that U.P. continued to use the bridge when the pier bedding was so obviously compromised. How could you be sure of the pier performance at any given train event when the condition of the pier was obviously changing over time? How many degrees can you tip a GP-38 before you concentrate so much extra loading on the tipped pier that it tips further?
What I'd like to know is how often trains were put through in a day and how fast they would run. I know there would have been restrictions but----
Also what would that offset do to the piers next to the tipped pier----I'd love to have seen what kinds of side loading would have occured with, say, 15 cars loaded----
My understanding is that this bridge was inspected much more frequently than other bridges because of its condition. The continuing deterioration of the bridge would have ultimately led to abandonment of the line, since there wasn't enough traffic to justify a rebuilding once the bridge became unsafe. But the failure of the trestle you mention hastened the end.
steve14 I found the link to the full NTSB report on Bayou Canot. http://ntl1.specialcollection.net/scripts/ws.dll?websearch&site=dot_railroads Go there and click on the year 1993. It is the first rpeort, noted as Amtrak. Also a good source for older accident reports
Thanks much, steve14 ! That's what I surmised happened to it. I'd seen that website recently, but it doesn't seem to be linked or clearly referenced from the NTSB's main on-line site. So that's a good one to save for future reference. For what it's worth, I got a slightly different URL for the INVESTIGATIONS OF RAILROAD ACCIDENTS 1911 - 1993 - Table of Contents page -
http://ntl1.specialcollection.net/scripts/ws.dll?toc&ds=82
And here's the direct link to the Amtrak No. 2 - Sunset Limited Bayou Canot accident report - it's 70 pages, approx. 4.23 MB in size for the 'PDF' format version:
http://ntl1.specialcollection.net/scripts/ws.dll?file&fn=6&name=*S%3A%5CDOT_56GB%5CRailroad%5CWEBSEARCH%5CRAR-94-01.pdf
Thanks again.
- Paul North.
Falcon48 Bucyrus blownout cylinder Bucyrus On that same line, there is a much larger, multiple span deck girder bridge on stone piers spanning the Minnesota River at Carver, MN. In earlier times, the M&StL routinely had commercial divers enter the river and inspect the bedding of the stone piers. Over the last 20 years or so, one of those stone piers has settled unevenly, apparently due to the river scouring out the bedding for the pier. Before operations ended, that pier was tipped toward downstream so that its top was about 12”-18” out of alignment. It was very visible as a large dip and offset in the bridge deck, and in just looking at the pier compared to the rest of the piers. I found it hard to believe that U.P. continued to use the bridge when the pier bedding was so obviously compromised. How could you be sure of the pier performance at any given train event when the condition of the pier was obviously changing over time? How many degrees can you tip a GP-38 before you concentrate so much extra loading on the tipped pier that it tips further? What I'd like to know is how often trains were put through in a day and how fast they would run. I know there would have been restrictions but---- Also what would that offset do to the piers next to the tipped pier----I'd love to have seen what kinds of side loading would have occured with, say, 15 cars loaded---- Here is a link showing the bridge at Carver, MN over the Minnesota River: http://www.johnweeks.com/bridges/pages/rm01.html In the first photo, you can see the misalignment toward the far end. In the bottom photo, you can see the defective pier, which is third from the left. In this photo, the river flows toward the camera, and you can see the pier tipped toward the camera as well. My impression is that the misalignment progressed significantly further than shown here. During the final operations over the defect, trains were minimal in size, speed, and frequency. They would consist of one engine (GP-38) and 1-6 cars. Speed was very restricted over the bridge, to perhaps 10mph or less. The defect appears to involve only one of the piers. There is no indication of a structural problem with the integrity of the stone pier itself. Instead, it appears to be a case of the whole pier being tipped 5-10 degrees due to a loss of footing in the riverbed. Trees float down the river and lodge against the bridge piers. Over the last 20 years of operation, the U.P. and previous owner C&NW allowed the trees to accumulate into a huge floating mass covering maybe an acre or more. Then the company would stage a rail crane and grapple on the bridge to pick the trees out of the mass, and place them on the downstream side of the bridge. When these tree massing events reached their maximum, they apparently restricted the river to a narrower flow, which accelerated the bottom scouring around the affected pier. I know that yard tracks can become shockingly misaligned and still pass trains without derailment. But I found it rather surprising that the company would accept running trains over this bridge defect when is was obviously in the process (although a slow process) of developing abrupt, catastrophic failure. Moreover, the consequences of reaching that failure point while riding over it in an engine would be quite dreadful for the crew. Ironically, though, the eventuality of a pending catastrophic failure of this bridge was precluded by the abrupt, catastrophic failure of a small trestle only about mile south, which ended operation over this line. My understanding is that this bridge was inspected much more frequently than other bridges because of its condition. The continuing deterioration of the bridge would have ultimately led to abandonment of the line, since there wasn't enough traffic to justify a rebuilding once the bridge became unsafe. But the failure of the trestle you mention hastened the end.
I would suspect that they would have been really keeping an eye on that Carver bridge as it deteriorated, although I don’t have any specific information about their observations and conclusions.
But just considering the nature of the defect that was developing, I find it hard to imagine how one could establish a threshold where a certain amount of the defect was okay to run on, and once the defect grew beyond that threshold, it would not be okay to run on. It would seem that to establish that threshold, one would have to assume that the defect was growing at an even rate. However, I suspect that such a tip-over event would be growing at an accelerating rate. And learning the exact rate of acceleration would be practically impossible.
Bridges can collapse with no visible indication of a problem, so I am amazed that such an obvious, serious, and fundamental problem as a loss of footing that is tipping a pier would not condemn the bridge until it was repaired.
In a way, it is rather prophetic that the risky operation over that deteriorating Carver bridge was finally ended permanently by the catastrophic collapse of another bridge on the same line less than a mile away.
The irony is that they had a defective bridge on which they were relying on their own expert assessment of the growing danger to continue operation. And yet that same expertise on which they were relying for the Carver bridge completely failed them on a bridge less than a mile away. In retrospect, I wonder what would have happened had not that other bridge failed, and they kept assuring themselves that it was okay to continue operation over that Carver bridge.
Murphy Siding Would a fallen wood bridge genrally be replaced with a metal bridge? Do the railroads still build new wood bridges?
Depends - on a lot, including the span distances, the height, the required clearance widths and heights underneath, availability, economics, detour routes and disruption to the subject route and the detour routes, etc.
Recall that the longish - 3,000 ft. ? - UP trestle across the Sacramento River and mainly its floodplain (if I'm remembering right ) that burned from an arson about 2 years ago was replaced by pre-cast concrete sections that UP just happened to have already stockpiled for other projects elsewhere on the system.
Here in the East, a 50 ft. long 2-arch-span concrete and masonry bridge on the ex-Reading Railroad SEPTA double-track R-5 route was washed out in a heavy rain storm - Tropical Storm Allison - in 2001. It was repalced with a 3-span steel ballasted deck-girder bridge over twice as long - 114 ft. - in about 5 weeks. The rush project was the subject of a paper at the AREMA 2002 Conference, which was still available 'on-line' as of last week. See Emergency Bridge Replacement – SEPTA R-5 Line Undergrade Bridge 15.54 at -
http://www.arema.org/eseries/scriptcontent/custom/e_arema/library/2002_Conference_Proceedings/00012.pdf
[19 pages, about 3.34 MB in size for this 'PDF' format version]
Are failures on concrete bridges really rare? I was reading about some of the concrete bridges on the DL&W (?). They looked like they were built like a brick sh......station house. Some of the rock viaducts/bridges appear to be just as well built.
Thanks to Chris / CopCarSS for my avatar.
Other than damage caused by moving water - such as washouts, undermining, or scour, etc. - yes, really rare. Offhand, I can't think of a single failure of either concrete or masonry bridges other than those causes. Sure, they'll spall and drop chips and rocks, but that's usually more cosmetic and just disturbing to those below than as an indication of loss of structural capacity.
You got it right - those DL&W bridges will be there for a loooonnng time. Back then the technology was so new that a huge factor of safety was used. And, the concrete was made locally, so it wasn't too much more expensive to just use more. Plus, the dead-load weight of the bridge dwarfs the live-load weight of the trains, which is usually just a small fraction more. Concrete gradually gains a little more strength as it cures, which is technically a never-ending process, too. Fnally, they're so massive that the train loads are spread out over very large areas, so the unit stresses are much lower than for steel or wood structures that are constructed of built-up members.
A lot of those bridges are still standing 100 years later - like the DL&W's - or 150 years - Starrucca and Thomas Viaducts. Also around almost as long are the James J. Hill Bridge over the Mighty Miss at St. Paul, and the PRR's/ CR's / NS' stone Rockville Bridge across the Susquehanna River; also the stone bridge in Johnstown that took the brunt of the 1888 (?) flood, and 2 or 3 more since then, and is still there and carrying heavy traffic.
Paul_D_North_Jralso the stone bridge in Johnstown that took the brunt of the 1888 (?) flood, and 2 or 3 more since then, and is still there and carrying heavy traffic.
Yes, Paul...that's a famous one.....and has been added to {in width} many decades ago to accept 4 tracks. Floods of: 1889....1936 and 1977.
Quentin
Paul_D_North_Jrthe stone bridge in Johnstown that took the brunt of the 1888 (?) flood
Paul, you missed it by one year (I did have to look it up); the flood came down 5/1/1889. you were off by 1 out of 121.
Your mentioning this flood reminded me of warnings such as, "Don't play with matches; remember the Chicago fire." On hearing this, one little boy responded, "Don't spit; remember the Johnstown flood."
Johnny
Some years back one of the bridges across the Susquehanna(?) river in or near Harrisburg, Pa had a major structure failure. The bridge did not collapse but a chunk of it, I think, fell into the river.
I do not remember the year but this was a former Pennsylvania Railroad bridge, built in the 1800's. I think this happened after the Conrail breakup.
Thx IGN
blue streak 1One of the most important bridge failure is one that did not occurr on the Oakland Bay bridge. 1989 world series earthquake failed a section but it fortunately fell on the lower deck. That got California DOT to plan a replacement. The first stage was replacing of a segment that shut the bridge over labor day. An in depth replacement inspection found potential eyebolt cracks which extended the shutdown. More inspections later found other eyebolt cracks that again shut the bridge to traffic. These are DOT engineers that are really doing their job. However any large earthquake that has an earth shift would bring the present bridge down. A report today states that parts of Chile moved 10 ft to the west. Old bridges designed for that ? No. Newer bridges? maybe. Suspect suspension bridges might do better? PDN any comments?
The most well known other that the cantilever section of the SF Oakland Bay Bridge I can think of is the Queensboro Bridge in NYC connecting Manhattan with Queens.
Most bridges are built with a fair amount of give built in, to take some of the normal stresses of varying loads.
I close with this comment, I am not any kind of expert on this subject just read a lot of odds and ends.
Rgds IGN
narig01 The San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge eyebolt crack is something that has failed before elsewhere. In the late 60's or early 70's a bridge over the Ohio River failed and was traced back to a metal problem with a cast eyebolt. The eyebolt had a flaw in the casting with the steel when it was poured. The bridges that have this kind of architecture are few and far between.
The San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge eyebolt crack is something that has failed before elsewhere. In the late 60's or early 70's a bridge over the Ohio River failed and was traced back to a metal problem with a cast eyebolt. The eyebolt had a flaw in the casting with the steel when it was poured. The bridges that have this kind of architecture are few and far between.
You're thinking of the Silver Bridge collapse of December 15, 1967. It was an eyebolt suspension bridge, where the eyebolt was a single point of failure. Primary lesson learned was to design bridges with more structural redundancy, unfortunately the I-35W bridge was designed before the Silver Bridge collapse.
The Bay Bridge was built with some redundancy, even though one piece of the upper deck fell in the Loma Prieta quake, the rest of the structure was intact.
narig01 Some years back one of the bridges across the Susquehanna(?) river in or near Harrisburg, Pa had a major structure failure. The bridge did not collapse but a chunk of it, I think, fell into the river. I do not remember the year but this was a former Pennsylvania Railroad bridge, built in the 1800's. I think this happened after the Conrail breakup. Thx IGN
I believe you're referring to the Rockville Bridge - consisting of many stone arches - which leads from the northern part of Harrisburg over to Marysville and the Enola Yard there. Some of the masonry over one of the piers did indeed collapse, as I recall - it may have occurred in mid-winter due to freezing and thawing, and the piers may be a little hollow or just filled with earth, which would have allowed that to occur. I believe the damaged and repaired pier/ section in just in front and below the lead locomotive in this linked photo, where the light-colored concrete and shiny metal railing is:
http://www.railpictures.net/images/d1/7/2/1/6721.1240660517.jpg
Paul_D_North_Jr Other than damage caused by moving water - such as washouts, undermining, or scour, etc. - yes, really rare. Offhand, I can't think of a single failure of either concrete or masonry bridges other than those causes. Sure, they'll spall and drop chips and rocks, but that's usually more cosmetic and just disturbing to those below than as an indication of loss of structural capacity. A lot of those bridges are still standing 100 years later - like the DL&W's - or 150 years - Starrucca and Thomas Viaducts. Also around almost as long are the James J. Hill Bridge over the Mighty Miss at St. Paul, and the PRR's/ CR's / NS' stone Rockville Bridge across the Susquehanna River; also the stone bridge in Johnstown that took the brunt of the 1888 (?) flood, and 2 or 3 more since then, and is still there and carrying heavy traffic. - Paul North.
Did not the Penn central lose a couple spans of its brindge at Shock's Mill (sp?) after hurricane Agnes (1972)?
They are pretty rare. Back in the earl 90's or late 80's the Wisconsin & Calumet RR had a bridge failure do to ice at Lone Rock, WI. The train lost 4 covered hoppers of grain in the Wisconsin River and came within inches of having some coal follow them in. The wreck was in the Wisconsin State Journal.
And the IC&E had a few a couple of years ago when we had all the flooding in the Midwest.
Paul_D_North_Jr narig01 Some years back one of the bridges across the Susquehanna(?) river in or near Harrisburg, Pa had a major structure failure. The bridge did not collapse but a chunk of it, I think, fell into the river. I do not remember the year but this was a former Pennsylvania Railroad bridge, built in the 1800's. I think this happened after the Conrail breakup. Thx IGN I believe you're referring to the Rockville Bridge - consisting of many stone arches - which leads from the northern part of Harrisburg over to Marysville and the Enola Yard there. Some of the masonry over one of the piers did indeed collapse, as I recall - it may have occurred in mid-winter due to freezing and thawing, and the piers may be a little hollow or just filled with earth, which would have allowed that to occur. I believe the damaged and repaired pier/ section in just in front and below the lead locomotive in this linked photo, where the light-colored concrete and shiny metal railing is: http://www.railpictures.net/images/d1/7/2/1/6721.1240660517.jpg - Paul North.
It was a couple years before the ConRail breakup, and the bridge - which has 48 arches ! - was built in 1900-1902. Here's a little narrative from a website on Pennsylvania's historical roadside markers, at:
http://explorepahistory.com/hmarker.php?markerId=638
"On August 19, 1997, the accumulated effect of repeated freeze-thaw cycles forced some of the bridge's stones out of alignment at Pier 19 (the nineteenth pier from the east shore). When a heavy coal train passed over the weakened spot, the south spandrel wall failed, sending tons of stone, rails, ties, and four 100-ton loaded hopper cars into the Susquehanna. The repair and cleanup cost about $1 million, approximately the original price of the entire bridge. Since then, crews have strengthened the structure with steel tie-rods and braces, a process that continued under the ownership of Norfolk Southern Corporation, which added this portion of Conrail to its system on June 1, 1999."
Kevin C. Smith Did not the Penn central lose a couple spans of its brindge at Shock's Mill (sp?) after hurricane Agnes (1972)?
Yes, it most certainly did - about the center 1/4 of it. From a ''Wikimapia'' article on it, at - http://wikimapia.org/1557066/Shocks-Mill-Bridge - also known as the ''Shocks Bridge'':
"The bridge was closed during the flooding caused by Hurricane Agnes in late June 1972. After the flooding had begun to abate, subsidence was noticed at the center of the bridge on June 27, 1972. On July 2, 1972, the six center spans collapsed into the river. The collapse of the bridge crippled the Penn Central Railroad, removing 75% of its capacity. With Federal aid, the bridge was rebuilt with nine concrete piers supporting steel girders replacing the destroyed center section."
See pages 20 and 21 of 24 of the 'PDF' format version of the Penn Central Post employee magazine for August-September 1972, at [CAUTIONARY NOTE: This is approx. 10.7 MB in size !] -
http://www.unlikelypcrr.com/page3/Welcome_files/PC_POST_1972-08.pdf
And also ''Shocks Bridge is Restored'' on pages 14 and 15 of 16 of the 'PDF' format version of the Penn Central Post employee magazine for September 1973 [approx. 1.82 MB in size], at -
http://www.unlikelypcrr.com/page3/Welcome_files/PC_POST_1973-09.pdf
The latter has a low-level, poor resolution photo of the repaired bridge. Somewhat surprisingly, I didn't find any decent photos of the present bridge on-line. Unless I'm missing something, there's an opportunity to do something this summer - it's about 6 miles upstream/ west-northwesterly from the U.S. Route 30 crossing of the Susquehanna River at Columbia, PA and kind of out in the country - but there seems to be a 'Riverside Park' about a mile below it on the river-left bank = east or northerly bank, so that may be a good launching place for a canoe to get southerly light on the bridge for a current photo . . .
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