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The Burlington Northern Railroad Bridge 5.1, also known as the St. Johns Railroad Bridge or the Willamette Draw, is a truss bridge with a vertical lift that spans the Willamette River in Portland, Oregon. The BNSF Railway owns the bridge, and the 5.1 denotes the rail mileage from Portland's Union Station. The bridge consists of five sections, with the two sections closest to the bank fixed. The center section is a movable lift span.
The first bridge was built by Northern Pacific Railroad in 1908 with the middle section being the longest swing span bridge in the world. This movable middle section was replaced by a vertical lift span that was completed in 1989 at a cost of $38 million. This 516 ft. long lift span is the fourth highest in the world, providing vertical clearance of 200 ft.
The bridge carries 2 tracks across the Willamette River. Signals on both approaches to the bridge prevent trains from entering the bridge when the lift span is up, but as a precaution, trains are still required to radio the bridge operator and confirm the position of the bridge.
[edit] References
Wood, Sharon. The Portland Bridge Book. Portland: Oregon Historical Society, 2001. ISBN 0-87595-211-9.
[edit] See also
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