North Avenue Bridge Over the North Branch of the Chicago River

North Avenue Bridge (2009-11-28 10-48-55a)

There have been three North Avenue Bridges:

The first bridge was built in 1877, just a few years after the Great Fire of 1871. It was a swing bridge, a fact that angered real estate developers as well as shipping interests. The large clearance required prevented the construction of docking facilities near the bridge. They also created problems to navigation.

In 1890 Congress gave the War Department the authority to build new bridges and force changes to existing bridges if they posed a threat to navigation. In 1892 the War Department had a bridge constructed at Canal Street and then took a look at Chicago’s swing bridges. After much political intrigue (in Chicago?!? Who knew?) the go ahead for a new bridge was given which was built in 1907. It was a Pratt truss design in included sidewalks overlooking the river and streetcar tracks.

The current North Avenue Bridge is a fixed-span bridge over the North Branch of the Chicago River at North Avenue (Illinois Route 64) in Chicago, Illinois (Goose Island). This is the third bridge to span the river at North Avenue and was built in 2007-2008. It opened on 23 May 2008.

The photo was taken with a Panasonic DMC-FZ50 camera and edited using Luminar 2018. I used the Develop ilter to raise the contrast, shadows, whites and clarity and the Tone tool to lower the SmartTone. I also applied the Accent-AI, Polarizing, Details Enhancer and Denoise filters.

Photo © 2009 Gary J. Sibio. All rights reserved.

Text © 2018 Gary J. Sibio. All rights reserved.