Bascule bridge, still open to traffic, built 1906, rehabilitated 1997.
Excellent info at
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This bridge was designed by Scherzer Rolling Lift Bridge Company. Today this type of movable bridge is in fact known as a Scherzer rolling lift bascule bridge. In Chicago, where the city usually built trunnion bascule bridges, this is the only remaining example of this bridge type on Chicago's roads. This bridge apparently recently received ...replacing the majority of the bridge structure with modern semi-reproductions of the original material.
From the Chicago - Architecture & Cityscape blog:
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"The Cermak Road Bridge, built in 1906, is the City's last-remaining double leaf Scherzer Rolling Lift Bridge... AND.. The four large industrial buildings, built between 1901 and 1924, framing the Cermak Road Bridge makes for the finest intact, early 20th-century riverfront industrial precinct in Chicago.
These four buildings are:
- Hoyt Building [Nimmons & Fellows, 1909]
- Thomson and Taylor Spice Building [Chatten & Hammond, 1911]
- Western Shade Cloth Building [Lockwood Green & Co., 1924]
- Wendnagel & Co. Warehouse [1901]
In the City of Chicago, where majority of bridges built are trunnion bascule bridges, Scherzer Rolling Lift bridge becomes even more interesting. Designed in 1906 by William Scherzer, this double leaf rolling lift bascule bridge is the last of its kind in Chicago. In a trunnion bascule bridge, the bridge pivots around a trunnion, with the counterweight concealed below the street. But in a Scherzer rolling lift bridge the counterweight is suspended above the truss, and the bridge rocks backward away from the river."
More information on Chicago bridges at the Encyclopedia of Chicago site:
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Chicago Landmark status info (when the site is working):
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"The District commemorates the importance of the Chicago River in the economic development of the City and conveys how the interconnected river and rail network made Chicago a national center of commerce. Individually, the buildings are fine examples of early 20th-century industrial architecture, and collectively they represent an almost vanished aspect of Chicago's historical industrial streetscapes..."
My #1 son and I visited the bridge after attending a vinyl record swap at a nearby industrial building refurbished into an art gallery.