Mead Avenue Bridge

Mead Avenue Bridge. Built 1871 . Modified 1912 . Replaced 2014. From the 1850s through the 1960s Meadville's 4th Ward was a neighborhood of frame houses and small industries, home to railroad workers and tradesmen. It extended from French Creek to Park Avenue and was bisected by Dock Street (now Mead Avenue), Mill Run and the railroad. At the eastern edge was the Water Street business district. After 1900, older mills and machine shops gave way to warehouses and coal yards. In the early 1970s, urban renewal and construction of the French Creek Parkway transformed the 4th Ward, creating the much different landscape that exists today.

For 143 years this landmark structure spanned French Creek at the western gateway to Meadville. The unique "bridge within a bridge," an iron Whipple truss (1871) enclosed within supporting Baltimore trusses (1912), was one of the oldest metal bridges in western Pennsylvania and also one of the region's last remaining Whipple truss bridges.

The French Creek Crossing. A bridge has carried Mead Avenue (originally Dock Street) over French Creek since 1828 when a wooden covered bridge was built to link the town with the western part of the county. By 1870, civic leaders believed that Meadville deserved a modern showpiece bridge at its western gateway.

A New Bridge for Mead Avenue. Railroad construction and the oil boom brought economic prosperity and population growth in the 1860s. The bridge project was part of a broad program of civic improvements that included a new market house, a new courthouse, and widening of city streets. In 1871, the county hired the Penn Bridge Company to build an ornate iron bridge over French Creek that would complement the other improvements occurring in the town.

Original Design. The wrought-iron and cast-iron bridge was a Double Intersection Pratt through-truss, or "Whipple truss." It differs from the standard Pratt through-truss in that the diagonal members extend across multiple panels of the bridge. Due to its strength it was favored for relatively long spans like the 263-foot crossing of French Creek. Few examples of this design survive today. The keystone columns used for the vertical members were a patented product of the Keystone Bridge Company and fabricated by the Union Iron Mills of Pittsburgh, both early ventures of Andrew Carnegie.

Modifications in 1912. In 1912, Baltimore trusses were added to extend the life of the 40-year-old bridge, which was not strong enough to carry the weight of trolley cars headed to nearby Conneaut Lake Resort. The work was completed in one week by the Rodgers Brothers Company of Albion, PA with the cost shared by the trolley company and Crawford County, which was the owner of the bridge. Meant to last only another ten years in its strengthened form, the Mead Avenue Bridge remained essentially unchanged for another century.

The End of a Landmark. Even with additional support, the old iron bridge eventually was unable to carry modern traffic loads. Deferred maintenance, collision damage, and weather took a heavy toll and finally the bridge was closed to traffic in 2007 and replaced in 2014.