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Vintage
postcard
of the Trails Arch Bridge in
Needles,
California,
Burton Frasher, 1931.
Trails Arch Bridge Today, Kathy Weiser, April,
2008.
From 1914 to 1916, vehicles and wagons were
required to share the Red Rock Bridge with trains across the Colorado
River. Before that time, road travelers
crossed the river on the
Needles Ferry. But, in 1914, when a flood took the ferry out of
commission, planks were put on the Red Rock Bridge, where automobiles and
wagons crossed between trains.
However, in 1916, the old Trails Arch Bridge,
an engeineering marvel at the time, was opened to vehicle traffic. The
steel arch bridge was the very one that carried the dust bowl immigrants
to Calilfornia and written about in the Grapes of Wrath.
The bridge, located 800 feet downstream
from the Red Rock Bridge, was the longest three hinged arch
bridge in the nation for 12 years.
A substantial improvement
over sharing a bridge with a train, the arch bridge could only accommodate
one way traffic of trucks and busses. Furthermore, the bridge had a weight
limitation of 11 tons which created a problem when truck traffic increased
during World War II.
Soon, engineers began to
look for a new way for
Route 66
travelers to cross the
Colorado
River. When the Santa Fe Railroad opened a new bridge for their trains in
1945, the rails were removed from the old Red Rock Bridge, reinforcements
were made, and the bridge opened for automobile traffic in 1947. In 1966,
when I-40 barrelled through, replacing the
Mother Road,
a new four lane steel girder bridge was built and the old Red Rock Bridge
abandoned. After 22 years of sitting rusting in the sun, the Red Rock
Bridge was finally dismantled.
Today; however, the
beautiful Trails Arch Bridge continues to stand with its gleaming white
girders now supporting gas and utility lines across the river.
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