James River footbridge opens - Snowden, VA
Posted by: 
vhasler
N 37° 35.747 W 079° 23.444
17S E 642066 N 4162185
The Applachian Trail (AT) is greatly improved by the opening of a 625 ft bridge across the James River.
Waymark Code: WMCKK5
Location: Virginia, United States
Date Posted: 09/17/2011
Views: 6
The following article describes the opening a steel truss bridge over the James River, thus rerouting AT hikers from the more dangerous river crossing on the US501 traffic bridge. The $2 million project was completed in 2000. Over a decade later, the bridge is still in great shape providing wilderness access.
James River footbridge opens
Lead: At 625 feet, it’s the longest bridge in the National Park and Forest system. Hikers on the Appalachian Trail can now cross the James River without walking alongside traffic.
By Jay Conley, The Roanoke Times, Oct. 3, 2000
SNOWDEN, Va. — In the next few days, Cynthia Crotwell figures she can get started.
As the last 150-foot section of a prefabricated footbridge was floated downriver on a barge and put in place over the James River on Monday, Crotwell and other members of the Appalachian Trail Club watched with glee as their eight-year effort to build the footbridge neared completion.
When this 625-foot-long bridge is officially dedicated Oct. 14, it will be the longest footbridge in the National Park and Forest system.
At a cost of nearly $2 million, the bridge was the brainchild of Bill Foot, now deceased, and was paid for mostly by federally funded grants administered by the Virginia Department of Transportation.
The Appalachian Trail, a continuous footpath about 2,160 miles long, stretches from Georgia to Maine. For the countless hikers and nature lovers who flock to this section of the trail in the Matts Creek Wilderness area, the bridge represents a much safer avenue than the narrow car bridge half a mile downriver on U.S. 501.
Members of the Natural Bridge chapter of the trail club have spent three years creating 3 miles of new trails to link the trail to the bridge. The club maintains 88 miles of the trail in its area.
”This is exciting,“ said Glenn Collins, a trail club member and VDOT survey supervisor who watched as the final section of bridge was maneuvered into place. ”So many people have worked on this thing.“
Crotwell, a stonemason from Atlanta, was hired by the Appalachian Trail Conference to lay and shape the stones that will help hikers reach the bridge by trail and stairs on either side of the James. She estimates the work will take about three days.
In addition to helping the local club build its new trails here, Crotwell has repaired stonework along the AT at Dragons Tooth near Catawba. ”I love to come and work for the ATC whenever I can,“ said Crotwell, who is a member of a chapter of the Appalachian Trial Club in Atlanta.
In all 14 of the states the Appalachian Trail passes through, the safety of trail sections that share bridges with motor vehicles is being examined, Crotwell said.
”It was a dangerous crossing,“ Crotwell said of the 501 bridge.
She said the new bridge, built on old railroad piers parallel to U.S. 501, and the accompanying trails, are a vast improvement to the Appalachian Trail. ”Not only is it a better bridge crossing,“ said Crotwell, ”it’s a better trail. It’s in a much more pristine wilderness area. It’s better scenically as well as better designed.“
The project began in 1992, spearheaded by Foot, a former Natural Bridge club president who persuaded a Lynchburg man to donate the piers to the club for $1. Acting on behalf of the club, Foot then applied for two ISTEA (Inter-Modal Surface Transportation Efficiency Acts) grants in 1994 and 1998 that netted $1.5 million. The club met a requirement that it supply 20 percent of the project’s cost by using an appraisal of the piers’ value plus the worth of the club’s volunteer labor hours.
Foot died of cancer in May, just as the first section of bridge was to be erected.
The project was delayed several times, said Michael McCormack, a resident engineer with VDOT. The club and VDOT worked with Virginia Power, which operates the Snowden Dam downstream, and with CSX, whose tracks border one side of the river. It also negotiated with the governments of Bedford and Amherst counties to hold public hearings on the project and obtain the proper building permits. Ten feet of reinforced concrete were added to the piers to prevent flood damage if the James rises.
McCormack, also a Natural Bridge club member and an Appalachian Trail Conference board member, said the project was worth the wait. ”We’ll see much more use because it’s here,“ said McCormack, ”than there ever was on the 501 bridge.“