Checking out Monroe, Louisiana (Part 1)

Dear Readers, Happy 2022 to you all. I hope you are all prosperous, safe, and optimistic this year.

Kansas City Southern rail bridge over the Ouachita River, Monroe (Tri-X film, Hasselblad 501CM camera, 80mm ƒ/2.8 Planar-CB lens, green filter)

Monroe, formerly Fort Miro and now the seat of Ouachita Parish, is the "big city" of north central Louisiana. The family and I used to attend theater productions at the Monroe Civic Center and have flown out of MLU airport, but otherwise have not spent much time there. Readers may remember that in 2020, I followed part of historic US 80 through the northern part of the city (it was not too exciting). 

A Virginia friend asked about someplace to explore, and I suggested Monroe. We drove there on a sunny warm day and headed to the Ouachita River at the historic city core.

The railroad tracks come right through the business district and cross the Ouachita River on a beautiful old pivot bridge. Some railroad maintenance workers let us enter the railroad property and take photographs. They said the bridge still occasionally pivoted when a barge was passing on the river. The Ouachita is a Federal Navigation Project, meaning to is maintained by the US Army Corps of Engineers:  

"The Ouachita-Black Rivers Navigation Project provides dependable year-round commercial navigation from the mouth of the Black River to Camden, Arkansas, a distance of approximately 330 river miles." (from the Ouachita River Valley Association) 

I showed my Hasselblad to one of the railroad workers, and he was fascinated to look through the waist-level finder and see that the view was reversed left to right. Maybe I made a film convert.

South Grand Street may have once been the main commercial strip paralleling the river. The area looks reasonably clean and well-maintained. Empty lots show where old commercial buildings have been demolished. But the standing buildings have businesses or occupation. 

Many of these late-1800s or early-20th century shops and buildings used cast-iron frames and supports on the facade. This was a common construction method, and you still see millions of buildings around the country with the cast iron beams. Any old-town downtown will have these buildings. The big advantage of cast iron was that the vertical supports could be much more slender than masonry supports of similar bearing capacity. 

The side of buildings that faced the railroad were typically a bit rough or industrial. You definitely see this when you take the Amtrak through the Northeast Corridor.

These photographs are from Kodak Tri-X 400 film, developed by Northeast Photographic in Bath, Maine. I exposed them at EI=320, all hand-held. The light was bright and glarey.

This ends our short tour of the riverfront region of Monroe. Standby for Part 2.

Vicksburg's Railroad Bridges and Crossings (More Snow)

Vicksburg, Mississippi, has been an important railroad town since before the Civil War. One of the reasons that General Grant considered this to be a crucial strategic objective in the Civil War was the railroad infrastructure. The railroad from the western Confederate states (Texas and Louisiana) came through Vicksburg on the way to Jackson, Meridian, and other eastern Confederate cities. Once Vicksburg surrendered, the Union Navy totally controlled the Mississippi River and the Confederacy was split. This meant food and other crucial supplies could not move east from the western states.

The train still comes through Vicksburg. Let us take a quick tour of the railroad bridges in town. I suspect many motorists just rush over and do not pay any attention to the tracks below.

Mississippi River from Vicksburg, view west towards Louisiana, 1996, Kodachrome slide, Nikon F3 camera

Before the construction of the old bridge, rail cars were ferried across the Mississippi River by barges. This must have been dangerous work considering currents and changing water levels. The Vicksburg Bridge & Terminal Co. built the first bridge first bridge across the river (on the right in the photograph above) during 1928-1930. It uses three cantilevered truss spans and three Parker truss spans (from National Park Service). It formerly carried US 80 (the Dixie Overland Highway) but has been closed to car traffic since 1998. The bridge on the left was built in 1972 to carry Interstate 20.

KCS tracks from North Frontage Road, view NW towards Washington Street, Jan. 16, 2018, Fomapan 100 film

After emerging from the bridge on the Vicksburg side of the river, the track makes a long turn to the north under the interstate off ramp. The photograph above is from North Frontage Road looking to the northwest. North Washington Street runs on the hill in the snow in the distance.

View underneath North Frontage Road bridge (Tri-X film, Hasselblad 50mm ƒ/4 Distagon lens)

This is the view from underneath the North Frontage Road bridge, which crosses Stouts Bayou and the railroad (no snow in this 2020 photograph).

KCS tracks from North Washington Street, view SE, Jan 16, 2018, Fomapan 100 film

The tracks run underneath South Washington Street and head north to the Kansas City Southern rail yard. The view above is to the south. I waited for a train, but it was cold, and snow was falling on the camera.

KCS tracks view north from S. Washington Street, Fomapan 100 classic film

From Washington Street, look north and you can see the KCS rail yard in the distance. The track in the distance to the right makes a turn and runs under Washington Street again to the cut between Belmont and West Pine Streets.

Long-closed Fairground Street Keystone bridge from under KCS tracks, Hasselblad, 80mm Planar-CB lens, Kodak Panatomic-X film

The Fairground Street Bridge has been closed to cars and pedestrians for decades. It crossed the KCS rail yard. This photograph is from under the rail line that follows Pearl Street and eventually turns under Washington Street.

Washington Street railroad tunnel, April 2015, Panatomic-X film, Fuji GW690II camera, 90mm lens

Railroad cut between Belmont and West Pine Streets

This valley between Belmont and West Pine Streets must have been cut by the railroad before the Civil War. It is a rather convoluted route but may have followed natural gullies that required minimal dirt removal. The photograph above is from the Monroe Street bridge.

KCS tracks from Mission 66, view west, Hasselblad, 250mm Sonnar lens

KCS tracks from Mission 66, view east with Baldwin Ferry bridge in distance, Fomapan 100 film, Hasselblad, 250mm Sonnar lens

KCS tracks from Baldwin Ferry Road bridge, view east towards Vicksburg National Military Park, Hasselblad, 250mm Sonnar lens

As the Kansas City Southern rail moves inland, it passes under the bridges at Mission 66 and Baldwin Ferry Road. I expect most people drive over and barely pay any attention to the tracks below. In summer, the view is rather dull, but the snow made the scene interesting by outlining the topography.

KCS tracks from Old Highway 27, view towards 2-Mile Bridge, Vicksburg National Military Park

From here, the tracks head east towards Bovina, cross the Big Black River, and continue on to Edwards and Jackson. Back to the Vicksburg waterfront, the Vicksburg Southern Railroad runs along North Washington Street and on to Redwood and just north of the International Paper Company mill.

Vicksburg Southern Railroad tracks view south from Haining Road, Tri-X 400 film

Vicksburg Southern Railroad tracks passing through Vicksburg Forest Products lumber processing yard, Tri-X 400 film, Hasselblad, 250mm Sonnar lens 

Vicksburg Southern Railroad from Redwood, view south to International Paper Vicksburg Mill, Panatomic-X film, Rolleiflex 3.5E, 75mm ƒ/3.5 Xenotar lens. 

This ends out short tour of railroad tracks and bridges. These were all film photographs. Thank you for reading.

From the archives: Vicksburg's Fairground Street Keystone Bridge

Photo taken on 4 ×5" Fujichrome 50 film, 75mm f/8 Super-Angulon lens.

The Fairground Street Bridge crosses over the Kansas City Southern rail yard at the bottom of the hill below Fairground Street and east of Levee Street. The bridge was open when I first moved to Vicksburg in the mid-1980s and was open as late as 1993.

There was, and still is, an abandoned tank farm at the west end of the bridge. In 1990, I went into the grounds with my daughter and we climbed one of the spiral stairs to the top of a tank. I set up my 4x5" Tachihara camera and took some exposures on Fujichrome 50 film. The tanks had open valves and nasty fumes were venting into the air. This must have gone on for years (this is Mississippi, after all). These 1990 photographs show the bridge when it was in much better condition and the access road on the west side had not collapsed. These are resized to 2400 pixels wide, so click to see details.

View east across Fairground Street Bridge, 1990, 75mm f/8 Super-Angulon lens.

My photographer friend in town let me use his Epson V600 scanner to scan the transparencies. The light platter is just wide enough to hold a film holder for 120 film, so even with the 4×5" sheets directly on the glass, about 1 cm is cut off. But I cut off excess sky, so the important parts of the scenes are present. The 16-bit color TIFF files are 220 mbytes each. Later, another generous friend gave me an Epson 3200 Photo scanner with a light cover large enough to cover the complete 4×5" transparencies.

View west along Fairground Street, 2017. A light leak in the Hasselblad film back caused the flare on the left.

Levee Street view north, 1993, 4×5" camera, Fujichrome 50 film.

At one time, the bridge was going to be moved to the Catfish Row park near the Corps of Engineers Jesse Brent Lower Mississippi River Museum (910 Washington Street), but the plan never came to fruition. So it remains at the bottom of Fairground Street, rusting and decaying. Fate unknown.

April 2017 view of the bridge from the south. Kodak Tri-X professional 320 film, Zeiss Planar 80mm lens.

Bridges of Redwood, Yazoo River, Mississippi

For decades, drivers on Highway 61 (the Blues Highway) had to cross the Yazoo River at Redwood, Mississippi, on a handsome 1950-vintage steel cantilever bridge. Unfortunately, I do not have a photograph of the old bridge when intact. The old bridge was elegant in a mid-20th century industrial style, but no longer suited contemporary transportation needs. The two lanes were narrower than current standards, the bridge required expensive painting, and clearance was too low for some tall trucks.  Therefore, Mississippi Department of Transport (MDOT) built a modern concrete 4-lane bridge over the Yazoo a short distance south of the old structure. Rather than disassemble the old bridge, it was dropped in place using explosives on July 1, 2009. According to WJTV television, "The bridge was blown up at 7:50 a.m. and the blast was fueled by packets of explosives placed at strategic points by contractor Key Constructors. Boats on the Yazoo were halted as crews cleared the waterway." I missed the demolition because it was not announced to the public beforehand, but I drove to the site a few days later.

This photograph shows the east approach with some of the structure still standing.

This is the center span lying in the river. It must have taken several days to remove the debris, during which barge traffic would have been blocked. The Yazoo is a Federal navigation project, but commercial tonnage is low and the channel is seldom dredged.

A short distance to the south, out of sight of the highway bridge, is this abandoned railroad swing bridge. It has been unused since at least the 1980s. A few years ago, I read that these types of bridges were slowly disappearing from the US landscape, but one is still here.

The tracks and ties were removed a long time ago from the west side of the bridge. This is an example of the immense engineering infrastructure built by the railroads in the early 20th century. For many years, the best and brightest engineering students went to work for railroads because they offered the most challenging careers.

Finally, a slightly off-topic photograph. This is the auditorium of the Radwood elementary school on May 7, 2011, when the Mississippi and Yazoo Rivers were at record flood levels. The school built temporary levees to keep out the water, and books, furniture, and other materials were moved to the auditorium, which was a bit higher than the other rooms. Fortunately, the flood waters did not reach the building and no equipment was damaged.

As a final example of bridges and railroad engineering, here is a monumental lift bridge on the Cuyahoga River, in Cleveland, Ohio. I have never seen this bridge in use, and it is rusting and deteriorating. But look at its massive construction.  I hope it will preserved as a mechanical or civil engineering monument. Also, look to the lower left and you can see a swing bridge similar to the one at Redwood.

Most photographs taken with an Olympus E-330 digital camera. The two sepia frames are from a Sony DSC-W7 compact camera.