King's Highway 21 Bridge

This bridge has been repaired.

Ontario does not appear to have a lot of truss bridges, but a higher percentage of bridges seem to be maintained here than in Michigan. The Ontario Ministry of Transportation gives a date of 1963 for this bridge. Some parts of the trusses have rivets, but the connections are bolted, characteristic of a modern truss bridge. I was surprised to find latticework hiding under the top chord of this bridge. The KH-21 bridge has steel stringer approaches, one span at each end. The main truss span sits on simple cement piers.

There are old abutments next to this bridge, and they are concrete also, indicating perhaps a 1920s to 1930s truss span may have been here before the present span. Based on the design of the abutments, I would guess that it had no approach spans, and so would have actually been a larger bridge.

The restoration of this bridge included repainting the trusses, which really improved the appearance of the bridge. The paint will also protect the bridge from rusting and weakening. I was disappointed with the New Jersey Barriers they put on the bridge, because they will obstruct the view of the trusses somewhat. Still, I can't complain too much because they did not demolish the bridge.

A visit to this bridge in June of 2005 revealed that work was nearly completed. I photographed the restored bridge, and added the photos to the gallery. The loss of the less obstructive metal guardrails is unfortunate, but on the other hand this bridge is going to be around for a long time to come, which is excellent.