TRRS 532: BNSF's Fort Madison Swing Bridge
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 1 ต.ค. 2024
- FORT MADISON, IOWA - 11 May, 2018
Along the banks of the Mississippi River in Fort Madison, Iowa, the sirens are a regular occurrence, signaling the impending opening of the landmark BNSF swing bridge to river traffic.
An iconic crossing of an iconic river, this is a magnificent double-decked structure, with the double-tracked BNSF transcontinental mainline on the lower deck, and a two lane highway above.
Constructed from 1925 to 1927, this the second bridge to be constructed at this site. The original, opened in 1887, was a similar swing design but with only a single track and a cantilevered deck for horse-drawn traffic. By the mid-1920s the ever-increasing weight of the trains became too much for the original span and thus the Santa Fe replaced it with the structure we see today.
Altogether, the entire bridge contains a whopped 14,500 tons of steel and enough concrete to resurface 2.5 miles of US Interstate Highway.
Upbound River Tow:
Consist:
- ADM's Ardyce Randall
- 15 barges
Location/Time:
- BNSF Chillicothe Sub, Fort Madison, IA, Mississippi River Bridge, on 11May2018 at 14:15 CDT
BNSF Intermodal EB
Consist:
- BNSF 7052 [ES44C4]
- BNSF 4722 [C44-9W]
- Car Count Unknown/Mixed intermodal
Location/Time:
- BNSF Chillicothe Sub, Fort Madison, IA, MS River Bridge, on 11May2018 at 14:35 CDT
BNSF Intermodal WB
Consist:
- BNSF 8177 [ES44C4]
- BNSF 5399 [C44-9W]
- BNSF 7672 [ES44DC]
- BNSF 4943 [C44-9W]
- BNSF 4487 [C44-9W]
- Car Count Unknown/Mixed intermodal
Location/Time:
- BNSF Chillicothe Sub, Fort Madison, IA, MS River Bridge, on 11May2018 at 15:03 CDT
Thanks for watching! Make sure to leave a like and subscribe, for more from the Thornapple River Rail Series! Your support keeps this channel rolling - don’t forget to leave your thoughts and questions in the comments below!
Also like TRRS on Facebook! / thornappleriverproduct...
Videography Equipment:
- Primary: Sony FDR-AX53 4K Camcorder
- Secondary: Sony HDR-PJ790V HD Camcorder
- Aerial Platform: DJI Phantom 3 Advanced Drone
- Radio Scanner: Uniden Bearcat BC125AT
- Edited with: Cyberlink PowerDirector 16
Created by Alex Christmas. Copyright 2018, as the Thornapple River Rail Series, All Rights Reserved
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Awesome. FM is my home town, and my mother was buried in Illinois. On the day of her funeral, we got stuck on the bridge on our way to the burial, and there were two barges passing through it at the same time - one northbound, one southbound. I was able to get incredible views of them as they passed through. Dad was beside himself that we would be late, but I felt as if Mom had set this up for us to see on such a sad day.
I lived in Fort Madison, Iowa for a while and got to travel the bridge many times. You forgot to mention though that The double-decker bridge, about 1 mile (1.6 km) long with a swing span of 525 feet (160 m), was the longest and largest double-deck swing-span bridge in the world.
Not my neighborhood, but traveled by this location and had the pleasant opportunity to watch the entire sequence as you recorded. Thanks for the video. Nicely done. To me the marvel and technology that is 90 years old and still functions to this day, humbles me as to what our forefathers have built. A welcome break for the the ultra sanitized modern structures. History. Living.
Another homerun video! If there were a 10X-thumbs-up button, I'd've just tapped it! Santa Fe was, and by extension BNSF, is so lucky that that bridge was built as a double track span and also that it is high enough, just barely, to clear double stack domestic containers. That bridge was already 50 yrs-old when the very first double stacks took to the rails, and those international containers of the late 1970's and early '80's were still a couple of feet shorter than the domestic containers of today.
Indeed, imagine the headache if this were a single track and too low! Amazingly the first bridge at the sight was also double-track, if my source was correct! Talk about foresight.
Was just wondering if it was a double so thank you man! AMAZING bridge!
@@ThornappleRiverRailSeries - Double tracking was very common in the 1800s due to poor communications and signaling as compared with the 20th century.
Thank you for showing us a piece of history that is still in use. Good day and make more videos too.
I have cousins that live in Cedar Rapids, IA. On my way back home to Nashville, TN, after visiting them, my stops over time have been at Mount Pleasant, Burlington, Keokuk, and Ft. Madison. So I've seen the swing bridge do it's thing several times.
An excellent video covering all aspects of the bridge operation! The double stacked containers sure don't appear to have much clearance.
I'm wondering how Edwardian thinking there must have brought about such a generous loading guage.
I've seen this bridge on Railfans live stream, it is so good to be able to see it up close and working. Great Video Quality too.
I've been over that bridge countless times, that's my home town, I really appreciate Fort Madison getting some rail fan attention.
Ft. Madison is a rail fan’s freak show with awesome river barge traffic for a backdrop. I’ve taken a Google Maps street level virtual tour and get the sense that the community has a lot of civic pride as shown by how historic homes and structures are handsomely maintained and neighborhoods are beautifully groomed. I think I’d love living there BUT, having lived in San Antonio for more than 70 years I know I don’t have the wiring to endure the winter weather. Congrats to dirtcheapjeep - obviously he does! :-)
Virtual Railfan has a camera here.
I have too - lived close by 5 miles away - worked in Ft Madison at one time. Been all up and down the river, so much that I took it for granted, never really figured to the bridge to be a great engineering feat or iconic or anything like that. Stopped any number of times waiting on barges, boats of all shapes/sizes. I am amazed, however, how they coordinate all the river traffic and train traffic, considering how hard it is to stop one of those trains going nearly 100. My brother worked on a barge at one time.
good thing they built the bridge with plenty of height clearance, today's double stack trains have clearance.... also its amazing the amount of weight on the center pilings in the middle of the river....it seems the bridge weight could just push those pilings right down into the bottom.... what great engineering!!!!!!
I have been on this bridge a few times. In September 2016, I had the privilege of being the only vehicle eastbound. I got out and took quite a few pictures. There was a southbound on the ex-BN waiting, as was an eastbound. Got a couple of shots of the prison also. Only until the barge was through, did another vehicle show up. Sun was setting, gorgeous views of the Mighty Mississippi River indeed. Excellent video, as usual!
amazing. great video. love as always. thx so much.
I have been across this bridge as well, but on Amtrak's Southwest Chief
I've been on that bridge so many times I took it for granted and it was quite annoying, actually, when you're in a rush and had to wait on it.
I've got to admit,that was pretty interesting.
An Overall Excellent Presentation. Thanks for Solid Content and an always Interesting Video. 👍
Glad you enjoyed it!
@@ThornappleRiverRailSeries My only wish is that you might make another vid using a drone. Outstanding presentation.
This is my hometown, It is also great for railfanning because it has an average of 127 trains every day and I heard one honk while I made this comment!
The bridge is really cool but that is some skill driving the tug thru the opening of the span.
Pushing the barges, I don't know how they can steer (aim!) so well.
Great video, editing and narration work. Excellent video Alex. Always enjoyable.
I drove across this bridge with my parents in August 2021. We were visiting my sister in Springfield, Illinois, and before flying home, we wanted to visit Nauvoo. So we did so, plus went across the Mississippi River into Fort Madison for lunch. That added Iowa to my list of states I've visited.
Compliments the Virtual Railfan camera perfectly, thankyou very interesting.
There’s really no room to spare for those double stack containers, I’d say if they added a couple more layers of paint on those containers they might just rub the top
I was just thinking the same thing!
Tunnels are like that too. I remember seeing a video of a freight hopper clogging than nearly getting smashed off.
Very impressive Bridge and Boat! Thanks a lot.
Alex, Another top notch (or should that be notch 8😀) video. I really appreciate how thorough you research your videos before hand. Then you professionally edit and voice track it. Kudos for a job well done. In my books you're in the top 3 rail fanners on TH-cam.
Excellent job. Where do I start? Great lingering scenes, awesome close-ups, silence where needed and good old-school narration. Sub'd! Nice also to see the barges, river industry!
Thank you for this video. We have crossed this bridge twice on Amtrak in May 2019.
Excellent! I've been watching this on the railcam thingumijig, and it's nice to get a very good closeup view of it
That's a remarkable bridge and you did a great job of filming and narrating its operation. Drawbridges have always been a favorite of mine and this one's pretty much unique.
Beautiful bridge, and amazing its still in such heavy service. Unfortunately these things cant last forever, I wonder if the freight rail roads have been planning their long term infrastructure renewal.
Excellent and informative , professional narration. Many thanks indeed! Additionally, I much appreciated the pauses between the facts you provided. I subscribed to you some time ago and I’m glad I did. We don’t have many road and rail combined bridges here in the UK but there was a famous one on the Ballachulish railway near Oban in The Scottish Highlands where road traffic was allowed to cross between trains (which weren’t very frequent) but after the railway closed in the early 1960s it became a road traffic only bridge over the treacherous tidal Falls of Lora (I think I’ve spelled it correctly). Thanks again, Rob.
This is like those cool Nova or NatGeo videos you would watch in class. Or Discovery channel before it became a reality TV and pseudoscience network.
I'm glad the announcer didn't talk constantly or make dumb jokes like so many do and let the pictures tell most of the story.
i wonder what it feels like in that control house when the train hits that swing area? anybody been up in there for that?
Never even heard of Ft. Madison until the Virtual Railfan cams arrived. It's on my bucket list, it sounds like a serious (if underrated) rail hot spot.
Was just there today. Definitely worth the trip. Since we were on a bit of a schedule only 30 40 minutes for some stretching of the legs and some impromptu railfanning but in that time BNSF put on quite a show with 4 trains.
Sadly no barge traffic.
Very impressive! Really dig all the history & facts you speak of as well, makes the video all the better for it...great video!
Полёт инженерных мыслей не знает границ.👍
2:00 When I was little, I used to get a toy wooden turntable bridge to add on my wooden train table
Working on those river tows is dangerous. Years ago a friend of mine fell from one and was drowned. Even with life vests the turbulence created by the tow survival is far from guarsnteed.
My brother worked on one at one time. He never really talked much about the danger - most of the time the crew really had nothing to do so they slept, but when they're needed - he tied the boats to docks - they're needed. I can well imagine they must be quite dangerous.
Gorgeous video in every way. Most enjoyable, thanks a lot.
I'm glad the announcer didn't talk constantly or make dumb jokes like so many do and let the pictures tell most of the story.
Now THAT'S A bridge! Great video! Looks closely at 2:20 and you can see a PTC antenna on the top of the bridge.
PTC?
@@bullmiller175 Positive Train Control
I grew up on the Illinois side of this bridge, about 35 miles SE.
The toll was 10 cents when I was a kid, but slowly raised.
Iowa was a “dry state” until around 1963 - so the restaurants (with bars) were on the Illinois side :-)
The Virtual Railfan channel is streaming a live cam on TH-cam at this location since yesterday (June 26th 2020), and I've learned about the existence of that bridge within that live cam. I wanted to see the bridge in action, and your video is the very first result when searching on TH-cam, and for some good reason, because you can't hardly showcase it any better. Excellent job!
Wow, cool to hear! I’ll have to check that out. Glad to be a good primer on the bridge and area for you and others!
Never seen a normally closed swing bridge or one that carried both both vehicular and rail traffic. Great vid. & love your narration.
What a beautiful bridge!
I do really like your video: silent, focused on the main subject and without any unnecessary or distracting "special effects".
Thank you very much for sharing. Harald
Excellent video! What an impressive structure. If I'm never able to travel to see this in person I'm glad you were able to share it with us.
What an engineering marvel! Great video!
I love this video! After seeing one of your past videos on this bridge I put it on my rail fanning bucket list!
lived in ft Madison all my life. it's an awesome bridge
Isso é um verdadeiro espetáculo.parabens pelo o vídeo
So if we were drive our vehicle across this bridge, doesn't that make us a customer of the BNSF??
I guess so?
Great video! I check the VRF Fort Madison site numerous times a day. Don’t see anything like this here in New Jersey.
Absolutely; cracking video, thanks for posting it. ❤👍
We need to see more videos like this one. Great video
Fort Madison is such a good hotspot. I watch the railcam here once in a while! How many trains run per day there?
I'm in Australia
I found your video very interesting and you are very informative
great stuff
I PRAY EVERYONE GETS WHAT THEY WANT AMEN🙏
Now ... THIS is how to present a swing bridge video.
wow he's really fighting that current
I have been watching this video closely, mesmerized as usual ! I love ancient forms of infrastructure. Traffic is fairly steady.
Can someone please tell me why building a proper bridge is NOT feasible ?
A taller bridge would require miles of approach fill to get the railroad up high enough. Thus, the cheaper option is to keep the low-slung bridges like this. In terms of replacing this older specimen, these structures were built to last, and will last almost indefinitely with proper maintenance.
@@ThornappleRiverRailSeries Much Abliged. I have NEVER seen a railfan channel better than yours!
9:30: Now I know why "free shipping" takes 2 and a half weeks.
thanks much for the video. would have seen this awesome.
our America at work! TY for sharing
Historic though it definitely is, BNSF is going to have to start thinking about the successor to this bridge.
There were preliminary plans to replace a pair of the fixed spans to the east with a new lift span, but that fell through and never made it very far. The Coast Guard wants to move the channel eastwards toward the middle of the river.
@@ThornappleRiverRailSeries I've been over this bridge many times, both in car and on bicycle, and have been caught by boats many times too. I would not take a job that would require me to cross this bridge. Weight is limited to 30 tons and semis are not permitted.
I’ve heard plans about dropping the car part of the bridge and rebuilding only a train bridge but I’m not sure how true that is.
polyrhythmia One of my friends is very worried about that as he works at the prison and with out this bridge he would have to go through keokuk or Burlington which both add a good 30 minutes to his daily commute. It is becoming a high possibility as this bridge is becoming very old and rebuilding a bridge with the road part would be very expensive for BNSF.
I like train videos on TH-cam 👍
Once again a proof in the USA everything has to be BIG and SPECIAL.
Love the bridge. It's an idea to realize on my train layout which I start building next year.
By the way, does anybody know how deep the river is where the central turning point of this bridge is standing.
Greetings from the Čech Republic 🇨🇿
Impressionnant et superbe. Rien de plus...
Thanks that was a great show. Americana at its best.
Ok ,now being wide what goes on where everything comes together ,I can imagine whst does but really don't, we have a turning bridge over the Ohio ,between New Albany, Indiana and Louisville Kentucky, been told only opened once in its life ,cant use anymore ,was a interesting sound ,open span the railroad still use it ,it was called the K&I years ago 😀
We used to have a similar one here in MN between Newport/St. Paul Park and Inver Grove Heights. Pretty similar. Was a private toll bridge. No trains since '81, Car traffic stopped in '99 due to a bad pier. Then part of it collapsed in '08. The swing span was demolished but on the west side some of it was saved. Kind of sad because it was a hidden gem to me!
this is super cool. where I'm from we have a swing bridge, (Miramichi's Morrissy Bridge) and I was 4 when the bridge closed but even before then the swing portion wasn't in use. in 2008 it was deemed unsafe and it was almost taken down in 2009 but I'm glad they didn't because that is a huge deal in Miramichi
Main line of the Santa Fe - 75 trains a day
1:55 A bridge turntable?! I don't see that every day!
In the Netherlands there are several turntable bridges but smaller as this one.
Greetings from the Čech Republic 🇨🇿
Im used to them. Theres 3 in toledo, used to be more
Another great video :-) The narration makes it double as good. Thanks for all the details. And as mentioned by other viewers what a "luck" is was build for double stack trains. BR Adam from Denmark
Excellent commentary.
A very cool bridge....
Great video. Loved the style of it, and the picture quality is absolutely top drawer. Excellent stuff.
Nice work. I filmed the Milwaukee Road swing bridge at LaCrosse WI. Pretty amazing how long these have been operating. I’m afraid they won’t be around too much longer so it’s great to see them now!
Need to bring back the webcam. Been gone for over 5 years now.
VRF has a web cam.
@@lawrencewheeler8868 I saw that. Totally awesome.
That was cool to watch.
Would you ever think of doing anything on the CP watertown sub? If you ever did I could give you train numbers
I just assumed the bridge only operated on the train schedule, never realized trains would have to stop.
River was there first, so it takes priority. Plus watercraft are harder to stop!
@@ThornappleRiverRailSeries I'll have to disagree with it's harder to stop a watercraft than a train. I drove many ships in the Navy and large personal water craft as a civilian, I can stop them a lot faster than a train.
The bridge opening and closing is really cool! I wonder if river trafic sometimes stacks up to all go through at one opening.
Hi Dan!!
Hopefully that won't happen. Barge traffic has first priority!
I used this bridge in a book called, "How to Become a Crazy Cat Lady to Survive the Zombpocalypse." What better way to stay safe from the zombie hordes wandering away from the greater Chicago area than swinging the bridge after blowing up all the ones that couldn't be raised.
That's Awesome
Damn good job!
amazing bridge
Super bridge..
Twenty years ago, I crossed this Bridge in a car on My Family Vacation on My way to Davenport, Iowa. F+L, Corey
I would like to do a rail video here in Evansville. How do I find out when and what trains are running?
Either figure out by watching or just hang out until they arrive.
That's nothing being below it opening and closing multiple times is what's really interesting you get to see all the mechanisms at work and you get to see trains pass right over you. When the river is flooding you can actually touch the bottom of the bridge from a boat and feel the train a few feet away.
Fifteen barges, eh? That's a lot of wheat, corn, and oats going to General Mills!
Your next box of Cherrios!
Nice work.
I've never seen a train towing actually tractor trailers before. That's pretty cool, along with the bridge.
That is not a tugboat,it is a towboat. They are sometimes called push boats,shove boats or line boats, but never tugs. To be exact she is the Ardyce Randall. Built by Jeffboat in Jeffersonville IN. around 1976.
A few years ago CN replaced the ex CNW 1899 lattice truss swing bridge over the Fox River on their mainline in Oshkosh, WI with a single leaf roller bascule bridge. Even though the old bridge had some issues with its foundation, it was still able to clear double stacked containers.
The new bridge opens and closes far more quickly than the old span.
Should a time come when North American railroads have to convert to overhead catenary electric for tractive power, good bye double stacks, tri-level auto racks and Superliners.
Francis Scott Key, Fort Madison, Pelican Island, it is a 2024 trend. If we get another barge/bridge incident this year conspiracy theory's will no longer be theory's. 😮😅a
Only a few dozen motorists waiting to cross this bride? Sounds like a very minor highway. I would expect thousands of cars to be backed up for tens of miles over a 20 or 30 min wait.
This Is Great Watching The Fort Madison Iowa Swingbridge 😊😊😊 🚂🚂🚂
Maybe they don't need gates for trains to stop at a rotator swing bridge when the rotator swing bridge rotates to let the boats, big boats and even freighter ships to run through as well.
I'm not sure what you and thunderbolt 1000 are doing with your audio, but it's so ridiculously bad in this video that you actually can't even play the first 30 seconds, and if you do you will hear zero words you said and leave with a giant headache.
One tug sunk in Illinois east Peoria blocking traffic untill it was rescued
How many ways did I enjoy this video. Great narration, great filming, time on each scene so you can feel a little like you would if actually there. Very mellow. No somebody-else’s-taste-in-music. Great style over all.
. another key point is somehow keeping ambient sound in the vid. There is no way for me to grade that because you could put anything in there, but if it works it is OK.
No sound trickery here! I only add the narration clips in and adjust sound levels to prevent peaking and make sure the ambient sound doesn't make the narration hard to hear
Excellent video. I'm glad the announcer didn't talk constantly or make dumb jokes like so many do and let the pictures tell most of the story.
Great video and narrative. I’ve been over that bridge many times. I have family that lives on both sides of the bridge. It’s interesting that the toll is a one way toll and you are only required to pay going East from Iowa to Illinois. I love this bridge. I would like to try to incorporate it into my HO model layout someday.
BNSF should at least charge the barges $20 a pass if they're gonna charge motorists $2 lol