Santa Cruz County, California Bridges: San Lorenzo River Pedestrian Bridge

September 2009 (36.9844 Degrees, -122.0277 Degrees) San Lorenzo River Pedestrian Bridge

The next bridge across the San Lorenzo River is an interesting pedestrian crossing. It's a three span pony Parker truss bridge (the diagonal members slope down towards the center and the top chords are rounded).

The bridge is 300 ft long, with a 130 ft long main span and 85 ft long side spans.  It's made of cor-ten steel, which has a protective exterior that doesn't need painting. The superstructure sits on hammerhead bents and seat-type abutments. I would imagine it was built in sections in a factory and brought to the site to be assembled.

The bridge was in planning from 2001 and finally got built in 2008 after a lengthy environmental approval process. It was supposed to cost $2.5 million but ended up costing a little more due to change orders. It was designed and built by a consortium of engineering firms including TRC, Syblon Reid, and Parsons Brinkerhoff. It won an award from the American Public Works Association for the Monterey Area.

Santa Cruz County, California Bridges: San Lorenzo River Pedestrian Bridge by Mark Yashinsky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Amador County, California Bridges: Anne's Bridge across Sutter Creek

March 2013 (38.39299 Degrees, -120.80045 Degrees) Sutter Creek Footbridge

We avoided the State Route 49 Cutoff and took Old California 49 into the tourist town of Sutter Creek. Just east of town are a couple of tubular steel pedestrian bridges over Sutter Creek. They are Pratt pony truss bridges that use the railing as structural members to support the bridge. The bridge in today's blog has a plaque dedicated to Anne Conrardy, which suggests this bridge was at least partially constructed with funds from Anne's family.

Anne's bridge has a high camber, so it must be supported on strong foundations to resist the longitudinal force of the bowed superstructure. It has a grated steel deck to allow for drainage. The steel looks brown and is probably a type of Corten (weathering) steel.

These bridges look like they would be easy to fabricate in a factory or at the bridge site. A crane could pick up the bridge and set it on a pair of well supported abutments.

Amador County, California Bridges: Anne's Bridge across Sutter Creek by Mark Yashinsky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.