You are here

Texas: East, North Central, Panhandle and South Plains and West » North Central Texas » Weatherford to Cleburne » Bluff Dale (Erath County) » Bluff Dale Suspension Bridge

Bluff Dale Suspension Bridge

-A A +A
c. 1895, E. E. Runyon and William Flinn. County Rd. 149 over the Paluxy River

One of seven remaining early suspension bridges in Texas, this 225-foot-span bridge is 11 feet wide with 7 one-inch cables on each side passing over pylons made of 9-inch iron pipes, technically a cable-stayed design. The roadway is 2 x 12 wood planks. Suspension bridges were cheap, utilitarian, and easier to anchor in soft soils than heavy bridges with masonry supports. The bridge was originally built across the Paluxy River on U.S. 377, the main road from Stephenville to Granbury and Fort Worth. In 1934, the bridge was moved about a mile upstream when traffic became too heavy for its structure, and a new bridge was built in that location. In c. 1972 a new concrete bridge for County Road 149 was built a few feet to the east of the historic bridge so that the latter no longer carries vehicular traffic but is accessible for pedestrians.

Writing Credits

Author: 
Gerald Moorhead et al.
×

Data

Citation

Gerald Moorhead et al., "Bluff Dale Suspension Bridge", [Bluff Dale, Texas], SAH Archipedia, eds. Gabrielle Esperdy and Karen Kingsley, Charlottesville: UVaP, 2012—, http://sah-archipedia.org/buildings/TX-02-WC19.

Print Source

Buildings of Texas

Buildings of Texas: East, North Central, Panhandle and South Plains, and West, Gerald Moorhead and contributors. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2019, 251-251.

If SAH Archipedia has been useful to you, please consider supporting it.

SAH Archipedia tells the story of the United States through its buildings, landscapes, and cities. This freely available resource empowers the public with authoritative knowledge that deepens their understanding and appreciation of the built environment. But the Society of Architectural Historians, which created SAH Archipedia with University of Virginia Press, needs your support to maintain the high-caliber research, writing, photography, cartography, editing, design, and programming that make SAH Archipedia a trusted online resource available to all who value the history of place, heritage tourism, and learning.

,