Farmington River Railroad Bridge - Windsor, Connecticut - Railroad Bridges on Waymarking.com

"Composed of seven impressive arches that span a river and a road along one bank, this example of civil engineering of more than a century ago carries the two tracks of the Penn Central Railroad main line between Hartford, Connecticut and Springfield, Massachusetts. Viewed from either side, the structure appears perfectly straight, but a sight taken close to the stonework reveals a slight curve toward the east to accommodate the alignment of the rails. Building material is the Connecticut Valley sandstone characteristic of a wide area in the vicinity, dressed into large rectangular blocks of varied dimension.  The arches spring from massive piers of the same stone, whose width is extended upward in a pilaster effect to the capstones of the spandrels. This lends a texture to the plane of the wall surface beyond that of the rough-cut masonry work and defines the segments of the whole construction. Large capstones overlap by several inches the thickness of the spandrels and pilasters and finish off the top of the stonework in a suitably massive manner, with an extra block above and emphasizing each pilaster.

Set into the west side of the arch which spans the road is a carved sandstone block with the legend in raised letters: "Erected A.D. 1867."  Aside from periodic repointing of the stonework, a century of difference in track construction, and a concrete reinforcement around the base of one pier,/the bridge presents very much the same appearance that it must have offered more than one hundred years ago at the time of its completion." - National Register Nomination

Bridge Type: Arch Bridge Usage: Railroad Moving Bridge: This bridge is static (has no moving pieces)

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