Rockville Bridge

Rockville Bridge
Rockville Bridge in 1999.
Carries	2 rail lines for Norfolk Southern Railway and Amtrak Keystone Corridor
Crosses	Susquehanna River
Locale	Just south of Marysville, Pennsylvania
Maintained by	Norfolk Southern Railway
Design	Stone masonry arch bridge
Total length	3,820 feet (1,164 m)
Width	52 feet (16 m)
Longest span	70 feet (21 m) (48 equal spans)
Clearance below	43 feet (13 m) to avg. level of rock bottom
Opened	March 30, 1902
Coordinates	40°20′00″N 76°54′37″W / 40.3334°N 76.9103°W / 40.3334; -76.9103Coordinates: 40°20′00″N 76°54′37″W / 40.3334°N 76.9103°W / 40.3334; -76.9103

Two Norfolk Southern freight trains meet on the Rockville Bridge

The Rockville Bridge, at the time of its completion in 1902, was, and remains, the longest stone masonry arch railroad viaduct in the world.^[1] Constructed between April 1900 - April 1902 by the Pennsylvania Railroad, it has forty-eight 70-foot spans, for a total length of 3,820 feet (1,164 m).^[1]

The bridge crosses the Susquehanna River about 5 miles (8 km) north of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. The eastern end is in Rockville and the western end is just south of Marysville.

The original bridge on the spot opened on September 1, 1849, when the PRR began operating over it. The Northern Central Railway began to use it after abandoning their Marysville Bridge. The current bridge was built by Italian laborers, who worked for two contractors (Drake & Stratton), one on the east side of the Susquehanna River and one on the west.^[2] Local people from the Harrisburg area also worked on the bridge. For most of its life the bridge carried 4 main line tracks. They were reduced to three in the 1980s when the PRR Main Line was modernized across Pennsylvania. In the late 1990s an intermodal container was blown off an intermodal freight train and landed in the river, prompting Norfolk Southern to reconfigure the track layout by terminating the wye track to Enola at the west end of the bridge. This reduced the number of main line tracks to two, but left a buffer zone on either side to prevent further containers ending up in the river, although high winds from the departing December 2010 North American blizzard resulted in a similar outcome on December 27, 2010.^[3] Currently, the bridge is used by the Norfolk Southern Railway and Amtrak. The bridge was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1975.^[4]

See also

• List of bridges documented by the Historic American Engineering Record in Pennsylvania
• List of crossings of the Susquehanna River

References

Furthing reading

• Cupper, Dan (2002). Rockville Bridge -- Rails Across The Susquehenna. Withers Publishing, Pennsylvania (USA). ISBN 1-881411-34-6. 

• Jackson, Donald C. (1984). Great American Bridges and Dams. John Wiley & Sons, New York (USA). ISBN 0-471-14385-5. 

• Spavins, Jim (2009). 90 Days to Rockville. CreateSpace, California (USA). ISBN 1-4486-5534-X. 

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Rockville Bridge.

• Historic American Engineering Record (HAER) No. PA-524, "Pennsylvania Railroad, Rockville Bridge"
• Pennsylvania's Historical Architecture and Archaeology site photos:
• Rockville Bridge (photos and information)
• Rockville Arch Bridge at Structurae
• Rockville Bridge Photos (November 5, 2005)
• Stan's Railpix : Conrail Photo Gallery ( Rockville Bridge photos from Nov -1994 )
• The Rockville Bridge (Rockville Bridge Photos and Information)

Bridges of the Susquehanna River Upstream Marysville Bridge (ruins) Rockville Bridge Downstream George N. Wade Memorial Bridge

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