Twin Balancing Act

At one time, the New York Central, Pennsylvania, and Erie railroads all ran mostly parallel with each-other from their respective Chicago terminals (LaSalle St., Union, and Dearborn Stations) and southeast from the city center along an elevated line towards Indiana. Near 95th St. they crossed the Calumet River using a double-track Strauss overhead-trunnion bascule bridge and three double-track lifting bridges. (This was the background for one of the posters for The Blues Brothers [1980], seen here. The Erie line has been almost entirely abandoned through most of Indiana and Illinois, and its bascule bridge at this site has been mostly scrapped, leaving only the counterweight, upper pivot, rocker arms, and approach spans. Two of the remaining lift bridges are out of service and are kept in the raised position. The remaining lift bridge (the westernmost) is still in service, now owned by Norfolk Southern. It is still movable, as the Calumet sees frequent barge traffic as well as ore freighters.

Here, we see the North towers of the two out-of-service bridges.

Camera: Canon AE-1 Program (35mm SLR)
Lens: Argosy f2.8/28mm
Film: Kodak Ektachrome (ASA 200)
Exposure: 1/125 @ f16
Date: 23 July 2006
Negative #SV62-33
Cropped, spotted, framed, and captioned using Adobe PhotoShop &