for most of my life i have gone under this bridge and always wanted to know what it was for and when it was last used?
it crosses over the CNW\ Up west line i have always been curious
thanks
It was used for a CTA (or predecessor) line. If you scroll south, you’ll see that it’s on a line with the “Paulina Connector” (now the Pink Line). This line was taken up sometime after the “Milwaukee” subway to Logan Square was opened. Of course, it’s used every day now, to hold up signals for the railroad lines beneath it.
CShaveRR: Its early sunday morning and not enough coffee in the system yet; Where there are houses and buildings now, there was once a rail line? How long ago was the line taken up? Indeed South of the bridge there is what looks like a lite rail line. Is this the “pink” line of what you speak?
i grew up in river forest and we always took that cta line from oak park to the city. and dont remember anything running north of that line. so it must have been well before the 70s. i learned early that you doing get not off the train in that area. and i still dont. although work did take me near there a few times.
Back in the 1970s one could still see piers continuing north of that bridge. I don’t really know when it was taken out, but am willing to venture that it would have been mid-1950s, at the latest. The new subway route to Logan Square (via Milwaukee Avenue) opened in 1950.
The freestanding bridge to nowhere (also known as the world’s largest signal bridge) was originally part of the Met L Logan Square and Humboldt Park lines. As mentioned above, if you follow the map south, it lines up with the Paulina Connector and further south with the Douglas Park line, both of which are now part of CTA’s Pink Line. If you follow the map to the north, you will eventually come to the point where the Logan Square (now O’Hare) line emerges from the Milwaukee Ave. subway. That point is not easy to see but there is a 6 or 8 car L train in the picture at that point. The now missing line was taken out of revenue service in 1951 but continued in use for occasional equipment moves and work trains. The line was removed between 1965 and 1968.
Also see this link: http://www.chicago-l.org/operations/lines/paulina.html
Nice link, I’m going to have to explore it later. That thing always had me perplexed as well but I never thought to ask.
I agree that was a very good/informative link. I knew what the bridge used to be, but I didn’t know the full history.
With all of the old signal towers being replaced and given the age of the bridge, I wonder how long the bridge will survive before it too is replaced with a new signal bridge.
CC
Since removing it would be quite expensive (both direct cost and rail route down time,) I expect the present bridge will remain standing for quite a while.
OTOH, if the bridge’s value as metal scrap reaches a point where it equals the cost of removal plus the cost of a new, lightweight, signal bridge, it will disappear in a heartbeat.
It’s all in the money.
Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September 1964 - with catenary bridges but no signal bridges)
Hey, maybe those thieves that filch copper wire and such for recycle value will recognize the bridge’s scrap metal value and take the whole bridge away, saving everyone the cost of removal. [;)]
Don’t laugh, something similar happened quite a few years ago. When the City of Chicago built a new bridge over the Calumet River at 130th Street (next to the South Shore Line) after WW2, the old bridge was removed intact and stored in the area between the road and the tracks. The city wanted it for possible use as a temporary bridge elsewhere when another bridge was being repaired or replaced. At any rate, in the mid-1960’s, some thieves came with cutting torches and removed some of the structural members to be sold for scrap value. They were eventually caught. The remnants of the old bridge are still sitting there.