Attached to the northeast side of the bridge's centre pier is this river gauge. Graduated in metres above sea level, it is associated with a recording station, designated Station 05CC002, which can be accessed from
THIS PAGE and whose historical data can be viewed in graph or table form at
THIS PAGE. The bridge, incidentally, was retired from railroad service in the late 1980s, officially becoming a pedestrian bridge and part of a walking trail on September 13, 1992.
This river gauge was installed not long after the bridge was built, allowing a period of record of river level data from 1912 to the present. An automated recording flow meter wasn't installed until 1967. It was upgraded to a combination flow and level recorder in 2012. Prior to 1967 data was recorded and stored manually. Records have been kept continuously since 2012, except for the years 1931 to 1933, during which period data was only recorded seasonally.
With a drainage area of 45,100 square kilometres, the Red Deer rises in the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains and flows for 724 kilometres (450 mi) through Alberta and a portion of Saskatchewan. A major tributary of the South Saskatchewan River, it meets that river about 16 kilometres into Saskatchewan. Rising in Banff National Park, the Red Deer flows through several other provincial and regional parks before joining the South Saskatchewan.