The Delair Bridge (officially the Delair Memorial Railroad Bridge) is a railroad bridge with a vertical-lift section that crosses the Delaware River between

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania#Municipalities, largest city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the List of United States cities by population, sixth-largest city i ...

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

, and Pennsauken Township,

New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...

, just south of the

Betsy Ross Bridge The Betsy Ross Bridge, also known as the Ross Memorial Bridge, is a continuous steel truss bridge spanning the Delaware River from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to Pennsauken, New Jersey. It was built from 1969 to 1974, and opened in April 1976, du ...

. The two-track bridge is part of

Conrail Shared Assets Operations Conrail Shared Assets Operations (CSAO) is the commonly used name for modern-day Conrail ( reporting mark CRCX), an American railroad company. It operates three networks, the North Jersey, South Jersey/Philadelphia, and Detroit Shared Assets Area ...

and is jointly used by Norfolk Southern Railway and CSX Transportation freight trains, as well as by the

New Jersey Transit New Jersey Transit Corporation, branded as NJ Transit, and often shortened to NJT, is a state-owned public transportation system that serves the U.S. state of New Jersey, along with portions of New York State and Pennsylvania. It operates bu ...

Atlantic City Line The Atlantic City Line (ACL) is a commuter rail line operated by NJ Transit (NJT) in the United States between Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and Atlantic City, New Jersey, operating along the corridor of the White Horse Pike. It runs over trackage ...

service.

History

The Delair Bridge, built by the Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR) in 1895–1896, was the first bridge of any sort between Philadelphia and New Jersey. The steel span connected PRR tracks in North Philadelphia to southern New Jersey. It consisted of three fixed

Pennsylvania truss A truss bridge is a bridge whose load-bearing superstructure is composed of a truss, a structure of connected elements, usually forming triangular units. The connected elements (typically straight) may be stressed from tension, compression, or ...

spans and a through-truss swing-span drawbridge totaling . Approach trestles of on the Pennsylvania side and on the New Jersey side bring its total length to . Starting in 1958, the PRR converted the bridge into a vertical-lift span to increase clearance for river traffic. The movable link was floated into place in one piece to facilitate installation and minimize delay. Work was completed in 1960. The Delair Bridge was the longest and heaviest double-track lift bridge in the world at the time. Note that the single-track

Cape Cod Canal Railroad Bridge The Cape Cod Canal Railroad Bridge (also known as the Buzzards Bay Railroad Bridge), a vertical lift bridge in Bourne, Massachusetts near Buzzards Bay, carries railroad traffic across the Cape Cod Canal, connecting Cape Cod with the mainland. De ...

is longer. The bridge was also electrified in the late 1930s, allowing freight trains hauled by

electric locomotive An electric locomotive is a locomotive powered by electricity from overhead lines, a third rail or on-board energy storage such as a battery or a supercapacitor. Locomotives with on-board fuelled prime movers, such as diesel engines or g ...

s to access the Pavonia Yard in Camden, New Jersey, from the Northeast Corridor. Electrification was removed by January, 1967 but was restored in May 1973. However, Conrail ceased electric freight operations in 1981 and removed the wires several years later. Passenger train traffic on the bridge ceased in 1969 when

Pennsylvania-Reading Seashore Lines The Pennsylvania-Reading Seashore Lines was a railroad that operated in South Jersey in the 20th century. It was created in 1933 as a joint consolidation venture between two competing railroads in the region: the Pennsylvania Railroad and the Rea ...

service was cut to

Lindenwold station Lindenwold station is a train station in Lindenwold, New Jersey, United States, served by the NJ Transit Atlantic City Line regional rail service and the rapid transit PATCO Speedline. Lindenwold is the eastern terminus of PATCO; the system's h ...

after the completion of the PATCO Speedline, but was restored in 1989 when Amtrak began the '' Atlantic City Express'' service. Amtrak service ended in 1995, but

service has used the bridge continuously since 1993. The bridge's southern track was formerly reserved for freight traffic, and the northern track only used for the Atlantic City Line. As part of the

Pennsauken Transit Center Pennsauken Transit Center is a New Jersey Transit train station in Pennsauken Township, in Camden County, New Jersey, United States. It serves as an intermodal transfer station between the light rail River Line and the commuter rail Atlanti ...

project, a station complex where the River LINE passes under the Delair Bridge's eastern approach, platforms were built on both tracks. Both tracks are now used by both passenger and freight trains.

21st century rehabilitation

NJT 6013 coming off the Delair Bridge, May 2015

In December 2011, an $18.5 million

Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery Rebuilding American Infrastructure with Sustainability and Equity (RAISE), previously called Better Utilizing Investments to Leverage Development (BUILD), and Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery (TIGER), is a supplementary ...

(TIGER) grant was awarded to

South Jersey Port Corporation South Jersey Port Corporation (SJPC) is an independent public port authority which operates the ports along the eastern banks of Delaware River in the Delaware Valley region of southern New Jersey in the United States. Based in Camden, SJPC was ...

by the

United States Department of Transportation The United States Department of Transportation (USDOT or DOT) is one of the executive departments of the U.S. federal government. It is headed by the secretary of transportation, who reports directly to the President of the United States a ...

, partially for rehabilitation of the bridge. The improvements were completed.

References

External links

* *
Delair Bridge
at "Workshop of the World"
Video of rebuilding by Michael Froio 2015
{{New Jersey Transit Rail Railroad bridges in New Jersey Vertical lift bridges in the United States Vertical lift bridges in New Jersey Bridges completed in 1896 Railroad bridges in Pennsylvania Bridges in Philadelphia Bridges in Camden County, New Jersey Bridges over the Delaware River Pennsylvania Railroad bridges NJ Transit bridges Pennsauken Township, New Jersey Historic American Engineering Record in Philadelphia Towers in Pennsylvania Steel bridges in the United States Pennsylvania truss bridges in the United States Interstate railroad bridges in the United States South Jersey Port Corporation

History

21st century rehabilitation

See also

References

External links