Wilsonville Railroad Bridge

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So here are a few photos of the Wilsonville Railroad Bridge, taken this morning along with the Boone Bridge photos I posted earlier. As you can see, I had a much better view of this one, and the photos kind of suck less, or at least I like to think so.



There's not much to say about it really; there's a Structurae page about it, and what appears to be an unfinished draft Wikipedia page too. The latter has a few more links, including an old photo courtesy of the Wilsonville library. That photo seems to be of a previous bridge on this spot, actually. I'd be happy to share the history of bridges on this spot and so forth, if only I could find it, but I haven't run across it yet. And neither, apparently, has the author of the embryonic Wikipedia page, as a lot of dates and vital stats are just X's for the time being.



There's a (probably unofficial) trail leading up to the railroad tracks, where it ends. All I can figure is that it's for people walking across the bridge. Which I assume you aren't technically supposed to do, similar to the situation at the Lake Oswego RR bridge. I considered it for a moment, just a moment, before chickening out, I mean, coming to my senses, like I usually do. There's even less of a walkway here than there is on the Lake Oswego bridge, and I expect this bridge gets substantially more train traffic. So I walked up and took a quick peek, and then scuttled off to the car. Hey, I saw Stand By Me; I know this is a bad idea.



North of here, this rail line will soon host our fair city's new WES commuter rail train. There's speculation that once the first bit is up and running, they'll want to extend the line further south, possibly even to Salem, so this bridge would have a bit higher profile than it does now (and would be even more risky to cross, too).