Fort Worth gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1891-1898, 1892-03-21
A HIGH BRIDGE.
a Triumph of Engineering Skin on the sGn Hl
Southern Pacific, n SSlHy

Southern Pacific.
Special to the Gazette. ~
SzUArLA, TEX, aMarch 2O.-The great
high bridge of the Southern Pacific rail-
road over the Pecos river Just west of here
has attracted wide attention in engineering
and mechanical circles throughout the
country during the past few months. The
structure is now practically completed, the
work yet to be done being the driving of
about 1000 rivets. 1t is the third highest
bridge in the world, and is by several feet
the highest in the United States, being
twenty-six feet higher than the Great
Kinzua viaduct on the New York, Lake
Erie & Western railway. The Pecos bridge
or viaduct is 2lS0 feet long and 32S feet
above the surface of the stream. 1t con-
sists of forty-eight spans in all. They are
nearly all iron plate girders, alternately
Ghlrty-hve feet and sivty-tive feet long.
In the center of the bridge, Immediately
above the bed of the river is a cantilever
span lS5 feet long. The high structure is
supported by towers, which rest upon
stone lodges or rock piers. The dimension
of the towers at their base is S5x100 feet,
but they narrow down TO 10x35 feet at the
top.
The lightness of the structure gives it a
very scary and spider-web appearance, but
{tis pronounced by practical engineers and
railroad mon as being one of the most sub
starfial bridges in the country. The floor
ing is twenty-one feet wide, giving room
for a single track and two narrow footWays.
The bridge was thoroughly tested as the
work progressed, and it is claimed the
short span will carry two and one-half tons
70 the lineal foot and the longer ones two
tons TO the lineal foot = is capable of
carrying the heaviest freight trains. The
CirderS are of wrought iron and the towers
of steel. Although there is an immense
weight resting upon the stone piers, yet it
is claimed that the latter are perfectly sub
stantial. They are built of limestone,
which is said TO be remarkably hard and
compact. 1t was quarried at this place and
given test before using. BY the building
OF this new bridge and the new ''cut on
stretch OF track, the Southern Pacific
shortens its road from New Orleans to San
Francisco fifteen and one-half miles. The
old line through the canyons of the Rio
Grande. five miles south of here, is to be
completely abandoned. On the old line
there are fourteen large iron bridges, and
they will be Of no use when the ''cut-off' is
in active operation. They will all be torn
down and the abandoned track taken up
aud used elsewhere, greatly off-setting the
ceSt OF the new work. The old road was
built ~ great expense and has always been
considered the most dangerous stretch of
track on the whsle line of of the Southern
Pacific, owing TO the threatened land slide
and exposure 10 cloud-bursts which are of
common occurrence ia that locality. At
the time Of the first building of the read
practical engineers asserted that the route
then surveyed was the lesst expensive, and
in fact the only available one across the
range of mountains through which the tur-
bulent Pecos river flows until it reaches
the Rio Grande, into which it empties six
miles below here. Instead of going over
the mountains the old route winds its tor
tuous way around them and over numerous
lodges. the highest of which has an eleya-
ton of $50 feet at the ends and descends to
forty feet at the point where the Pecos is
crossed.
In 1885 the Southern Pacific company
sent out corps Of engineers 10 make sur