The Madison Bridge of Cook County
Today, a friend of mine is driving up to Madison, Wisconsin, and his trip inspired me to write about the Madison Street Bridge here in Chicago, also known as the Lyric Opera Bridge, near Riverside Plaza. Completed in 1922 and rehabilitated in 1994, this was the first bascule bridge in Chicago to raise the deck trusses above the deck to act as guardrails.1 (A bascule bridge is the movable type of drawbridge which people are probably most familiar with, in which a counterweight balances the span of the bridge, allowing it to swing at an angle. An animated example can be found here. A deck truss carries the roadbed on top of the connected elements [i.e., steel beams] that hold it in place.) It is 283 feet (86.3 m) long, 221 ft (67.4 m) of which are over the River. At 38 feet (12 m) wide, this bridge carries nearly 10,000 vehicles daily.2
Photo credit: (c/o Flickr) thomas.merton, stevevance, corydalus, mahansen.com
Madison Street Bridge: 360 W Madison St (approximate)
Public trans: Bus # 14, 20, X20, 38, 56, 60, 124, 125, 157
Brown/Purple/Pink/Orange Line train (Washington)
1 Holth, N. (2006). Bridges by County: Cook County, IL. Retrieved September 21, 2008, from Historic Bridges of Michigan and Elsewhere Web site: http://www.historicbridges.org/b_c_il_cook.htm
2 Baughn, J., et al. (2006). Madison Street Bridge. Retrieved September 21, 2008, from Historic Bridges of the U.S. Web site: http://bridgehunter.com/il/cook/16603427326/
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