The five-span stone bridge in Pakenham, Ontario is an outstanding example of a long, stone arch bridge in Canada and a highly significant heritage bridge. It crosses the Mississippi River (Canada's Mississippi, not the famous U.S. river) in the town of Pakenham, now part of Mississippi Mills, Ontario, Canada. Pakenham is located less than 50 km (30 miles) West of Ottawa.
Built in 1901 or 1903, depending on the source, it replaced older wooden bridges that were often damaged by spring ice. For the princely sum of $13,000 plus $2,400 for a temporary bridge, it took 9 weeks to build from locally quarried stone, employing 70 men.
The bridge is 82 m (268 feet) long, 6.7 m (22 feet) high, and 7.6 m (25 feet) wide. Each arch is approximately 12 m (40 feet) wide. The largest stone in the bridge weighs over 5 tons. It is often repeated that this is the only bridge of its kind in North America, however it is not the only five-span stone bridge.
Not only is the bridge beautiful, but its location is in a beautiful part of the Mississippi Valley.
There is a small picnic area for the observers that are attracted to this unique structure and picnic tables along the river near beautiful wildflowers.
It is fascinating that the bridge underwent an extensive rehabilitation in 1984 to widen the road, reinforce the bridge's structure and add wing walls. During this process, each stone was removed, documented and later replaced in the same precise location. The supplementary load bearing concrete structure is completely hidden so the only visible difference is the wider road.
Below, one of a group of old nails embedded in the limestone nearby.
References
Ontario: Pakenham Bridge
Pakenham Bridge
Images
Photos from the iPad of @kansuze in Pakenham, Ontario, Canada.
Enjoy!
@kansuze
Hello @kansuze, welcome to the Architecture+Design Community! Thank you for featuring the marvelous Pakenham Bridge.
For the best experience, we highly encourage you to follow/review our Community Rules (at the Right Side of our webpage on desktop or the About Tab on mobile) and our pinned “Welcome Message & Comprehensive Guidelines” post. We appreciate your interest in us and we look forward to your great publications here!
Congratulations @kansuze! You have completed the following achievement on the Hive blockchain and have been rewarded with new badge(s) :
Your next target is to reach 14000 upvotes.
You can view your badges on your board and compare yourself to others in the Ranking
If you no longer want to receive notifications, reply to this comment with the word
STOPThank you for sharing this amazing post on HIVE!
Your content got selected by our fellow curator @priyanarc & you just received a little thank you via an upvote from our non-profit curation initiative!
You will be featured in one of our recurring curation compilations and on our pinterest boards! Both are aiming to offer you a stage to widen your audience within and outside of the DIY scene of hive.
Join the official DIYHub community on HIVE and show us more of your amazing work and feel free to connect with us and other DIYers via our discord server: https://discord.gg/mY5uCfQ !
If you want to support our goal to motivate other DIY/art/music/homesteading/... creators just delegate to us and earn 100% of your curation rewards!
Stay creative & hive on!
Thank you!
Great photos!
A very nice bridge and awesome pictures! 😉
Well done!
Thank you!