131-year-old Pa. bridge may move to Alabama
Associated Press
Friday, March 21, 2014
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/mar/21/131-year-old-pa-bridge-may-move-to-alabama/
READING, Pa. (AP) – A 131-year-old eastern Pennsylvania bridge might gain a new lease on life in a warmer climate.
Berks County officials are considering a proposal to ship the Wiley’s Road Bridge in Ontelaunee Township to Alabama, The Reading Eagle reported Friday.
County commissioner Kevin Barnhardt said Alabama officials would use the truss span to provide access to a historic bridge that activists there want to save. The interest group, Workin‘ Bridges, would pay or seek funding to disassemble, transport and reassemble the span, officials said.
Barnhardt briefed the Reading Area Transportation Study on the plan on Thursday, cautioning that the proposal isn’t final and would need the approval of commissioners.
“The upside is someone would save the bridge,” he said. The downside: “You’d have to drive down to Alabama to see it.”
Township supervisors last year turned down a deal in which the county would fix the span and turn it over to the township. The county then planned to demolish the bridge. That alarmed preservation advocates who say such a rare type of truss bridge should not be destroyed, as well as bicyclists who use the span to reach Lake Ontelaunee without taking major roads.
Barnhardt said moving the bridge would keep its history intact, and the county hasn’t ruled out installing a pedestrian bridge that cyclists could use after it is removed.
Workin‘ Bridges wants the span to provide access to the 2,143-foot B.B. Comer Bridge over the Tennessee River near Scottsboro, Ala., which it is trying to preserve.