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WASHINGTON STREET BRIDGE #1
Chicago Tribune, February 27, 1891
In two weeks the Washington street bridge will be in position and open for traffic. The viaduct approaches are nearly completed, and when work on them is finished the Madison street bridges will be removed and carried down to span the river over the Washington street tunnel. Then, it is promised, work will immediately begin on the new and enlarged structure for Madison street.
Construction on the Washington street bridge superstructure and viaduct approaches commenced Sept. 1 last, and the entire structure is of a handsome and shapely character. It is mainly intended for light vehicle traffic, the purpose being that heavy traffic and teaming shall be accommodated on Madison and the other streets.
Work on the Viaduct.
An interesting feature of the work was the hoisting, Sunday last, of the large or western span of the viaduct into position by the use of two railroad locomotives. The span is larger than the generality of plate girders, being eighty feet long, and each of the two girders weighing twenty tons. Another interesting feature of the work is that it is all built upon the tunnel, thus making the tunnel, viaducts, and bridge practically all one structure. This combination of a viaduct overhead, a tunnel underneath, and between them rights of way for railroads and teaming is said to be without precedent. A feature of the tunnel which will be missed by old residents is the little square tower which stood over the west entrance to the foot passage. That has been removed and a new entrance made. The concrete in the masonry of the old entrance was too hard for picks and too resisting for muscular efforts, and so it had to be blown up with dynamite. Contractors in those days did work to last.
Dimensions of the Structure.
The total length of the viaduct and bridge is 664 feet, the bridge itself being 157 feet 10 inches. The viaduct approaches to the bridge begin on the east side of the river at the west line of Market street, and at the east line of Canal street on the West Side. The incline of the viaduct is one foot in every twenty-one feet, and from the base of the approaches to the top is ten feet, this being nineteen feet above the railroad tracks. While the viaduct and bridge structures make connection with both sides of the river, the preexisting roadways to warehouses along the docks have been preserved.
The height of the roadway of the bridge to the water level of the river is twenty feet. The width of each draw, or the distance from the central supporting pier to the opposite river bank, is fifty-two feet. The bridge itself consists of a double roadway twenty feet wide and two sidewalks each six feet. It will be operated by steam.
Cost of the Bridge.
The entire structure, exclusive of the bridge, was designed and superintended by Assistant Engineer J. E. Roemheld of the City Engineering Department. The King Bridge company of Columbus, O., contractors, did the mason work, the cost being $9,000. The railroad companies paid for the construction of the span over their tracks, while the West Chicago Street railway company paid for the substructures of the bridge.
Washington Street Bridge #1 being prepared to be moved to 22nd Street and Ashland Avenue in 1906.
Washingtion Street Bridge/Viaduct #1
1898
Annual Report, Commissioner of Public Works, City of Chicago, 1907
WASHINGTON STREET BRIDGE—The old span was removed from the center pier January 3rd, 1907, and transferred to Slip “A” near 22nd street and Ashland avenue and placed on temporary support. This support was constructed during December, 1906.
Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Co., contractor.
Cost of removal and storage of draw span, $5,478.14.
WASHINGTON STREET BRIDGE #2
Chicago Eagle, August 26, 1911
Surveys of the Chicago river at Washington street, following the approval of the bids for the construction of the new bridge which is to span the stream at that point, are already being made. The structure, which, according to the contract, is to the completed Dec. 31, 1912, will cost $237,000.
Chicago Tribune, May 10, 1913
BY HENRY M. HYDE
The new bridge over the Chicago river at Washington street will be thrown open to the public some time this month. The old bridge was closed and torn down in January, 1907. For six weary years the more or less pellucid waters of the river which runs uphill have been flowing unvexed to the gulf between the two pathetic stub ends of Washington street.
When the old bridge came down work on the Panama canal had but begun. The new bridge and the big ditch across the new bridge and the big ditch across the isthmus will be completed at about the same time. Apparently they are both engineering works of world shaking size and difficulty.
People going either east or west on Washington street have been obliged for six years to make a detour of a block at either end when they reached the yawning chasm which separated the two banks. The stream of traffic between the two sides of the river has been entirely shut off and diverted to either Randolph or Madison street.
The inevitable result has been that Washington street property owners for a considerable distance on either side of the river have suffered. One authority estimates that both real estate value and rentals are at least 10 per cent lower than they would be if during the last six years the bridge had been in place. He estimates the total loss due to the absence of the bridge at $285,000—which would more than pay for its construction.
It is now announced that some time this summer—as soon as people have begun to find their way across the new Washington street span—three more bridges leading from the downtown loop district to the west side will be closed. The three streets which are
to be turned into stub ends for from at least eighteen months to two years each are Lake, Madison, and Jackson boulevard.
In order to make sure that the hardy suburbanite shall have a straight sprint for the 5:08 train the city will build a temporary bridge for depot passengers only at Madison street. Other traffic between the loop and west side will be obliged to use the bridges at either Randolph, Washington, or Adams street. Unless, indeed, ferryboats are pressed into temporary service.
The tremendous delay of six years in the construction of the Washington street bridge has not only resulted in a serious loss to property owners, but has given real estate speculators an opportunity to profit by their misfortune.
People whose property along the stub ends of Washington street has stood still in value—like chips floating in a stagnant pool—have in some instances become discouraged and sold out. The purchases have been made by far sighted men who have kept track of the bridge building situation and who have realized not only the boost which will be given to Washington street values by the opening of the new bridge, but also the additional advantage to be derived from the stream of traffic which will be thrown into Washington by the closing of the bridges at Lake, Madison, and Jackson streets.
Washington Street Bridge #2
1913
There are, to be sure, many reasons and excuses offered for the six years’ delay in the completion of the Washington street bridge. The bridge was taken out in January, 1907, because the national government demanded that the Washington street tunnel be reconstructed to permit of unrestricted navigation and that required the removal of the center pier of the bridge.
At the start the city planned for a bascule bridge for a span of 140 feet and preliminary sketches were made on that basis. Then the sanitary district insisted on a clear space of 170 feet between piers and that required an entirely new set of plans. When the Chicago and Northwestern railroad company began the construction of its station west of the river it was thought advisable to widen the bridge, and that, again, gave reason for making new changes in the plans.
Meanwhile, year after year, the city council was making what appeared to be appropriations for the construction of the bridge. In 1907 $360,000 was appropriated, of whiuch $150,000 was to be spent that year. In 1909 $160,000 was appropriated to be spent during that year, the remainder of the necessary cost to be arranged for later. In 1910 there was a third appropriation contingent in the passage of a bond issue. Finally, in April, 1911, the general bond issue for bridge construction was approved by the people.
Because of an error in the wording of the ballot or some other technicality the bond issue was declared invalid. Pending the resubmission of the bond issue an emergency appropriation was made by the city council, the bonds being approved the second time at the November election of that year.
In August, 1911, more than four years after the briudge had been torn out, the work of construction was actually begun. The west pier was completed ten months later, the other in a year. The contractors’ excuse for the delay in this work is that they did not have plans of the old tunnel over the river on which to base their work. Actual work on the superstructure was begun in June, 1912.
In the opinion of leading bridge engineers and builders it should easily be possible to complete such a bridge as that at Washington street or the projected bridges at Madison and Jackson in one year from the day of beginning work on the foundations. There are scores of bridges in the country much larger and more complicated than any of these which have been opened for traffic within a year.
It is the regular practice of railroad companies, indeed, to replace old and outworn bridges without for an hour interfering with the regular stream of traffic running over them. The bridge across the Chicago river, for instance, over which the trains of the Chicago and Northwestern railroad ran into the Wells street station, was once entirely rebuilt in exactly the old position without closing it to the passage of a single train.
As if to show how much more is possible when dealing with a transportation company than with the public, the city is about to adopt the same plan in the building of the new bridge at Lake street. It is to be a double deck bascule bridge, the trains of the Lake street “L” running over the upper deck, with a passageway for vehicles and pedestrians below. Within a few months the lower half of this bridge will be entirely closed, while the “L” trains will run uninterrupted during the two years, and possibly more, it will take to complete the new structure.
It is to be said for the bridge engineers of the city that, in drawing plans for the new bridges, they are paying great attention to the esthetic side of the matter. The houses for the bridge attendants at either end are to be of solid concrete and of ornamental and pleasing design. In each instance the whole structure, with its approaches, is to be solid steel and concrete. The only wood used is in the creosoted block pavement. Plans for the bridge at Jackson boulevard are being drawn by the engineers of the sanity district, at whose expense it will be built. The city engineers have completed the plans for Lake street and are hard at work on Madison street.
MAYOR HARRISON has promised that the plans for the two city bridges shall be talked over with the municipal art commissions and the trustees of the Ferguson fund for sculpture have offered to provide some statues to ornament the approaches to the Madison street bridge on condition that they are consulted in the preparation of the plans. They are also willing to undertake the ornamentation of the Jackson boulevard structure under the same condition, though it may be several years before they will have funds available for the latter purpose.
Meanwhile people who shudder at the prospect of having Lake and Madison streets and Jackson boulevard closed for at least a couple of years may possibly get a suggestion from the casual remark of minor official at the city hall in discussing the six years’ delay in replacing the Washington street bridge. He said:
- If people had hollered loud enough, they could have had at least a temporary bridge way back in 1908.
Washington Street Bridge #2
Land Use Survey
Map 1-F
1943